STORY OF KACHA AND HIS ENLIGHTENMENT BY THE BRIHASPATI
Argument:--His coming to knowledge of himself by the instruction of his
father Brihaspati.
Vasishtha related:--Now I have narrated to you fully, and finished my
relation of the narrative of Sikhidhwaja; and hope you will imitate his
example, to set you free from all sorrow and misery.
2. Shut out the visible world from thy sight, and shut in thy passions
and affections in close confinement within thy heart; and continue with
the dispassionateness of thy mind, for ever attached to the supreme
spirit.
3. Reign in thy kingdom with the leteration of Sikhidhwaja, and conduct
yourself in a manner, that may secure to you the fruition of both
worlds (namely--the peace and tranquillity of thy mind in this and the
liberation of the soul in the next).
4. As Sikhidhwaja came by degrees to attain his enlightenment, so also
did Kacha the son of Brihaspati receive the light of his reason, as I
shall now relate unto you.
5. Ráma said, please to tell me sir, in short, how this Kacha the
saintly son of the sage Brihaspati, came to his reason and right
understanding, after he was deluded before by error as Sikhidhwaja.
6. Vasishtha began by saying:--Hear Ráma, another tale as interesting
as that of Sikhidhwaja, and the manner in which Kacha the progeny of
the god like Brihaspati was awakened to the light of truth.
7. As he has passed the period of his youth, and was about to enter the
career of worldly life, and had ere this acquired the full knowledge of
worlds and things, he proposed the following query to his father.
8. He said, tell me, O father, that knowest all righteousness, how
the animal spirit that is bound to the body by means of the too thin
thread of life, is released from the bondage of it in this temporary
world.
9. Brihaspati replied:--The soul, my son, is well able to fly away
easily and swiftly over the perilous ocean of the world, by means of
its abandonment of concerns with it.
10. Vasishtha added:--Kacha hearing this holy dictum of his father,
abandoned all his earthly properties and expectations, and left his
house and went to the forest where he took his shelter.
11. Brihaspati was filled with sorrow at his departure; because it is
the nature of good hearted men, to feel equal anxiety both at the union
as well as the separation of their friends and inmates.
12. After the sinless Kacha had passed three and five years in his
solitude, he came to meet unawares his reverent father, seeking for him
in the wood.
13. The son rose and did homage to his venerable father, who embraced
him in his arms and to his breast; and then bespoke to his father--the
lord of speech, in words that flowed like honey from his lips.
14. Kacha said:--You see father, that I have for these full eight
years, forsaken every thing and betaken myself to this solitary
retreat, and still why is it, that I do not enjoy the lovely and
lasting peace of mind which I have been seeking so long?
15. Vasishtha related--Upon hearing these sorrowful words of Kacha, the
lord of speech for Brihaspati told him again to abandon his all, and
then left him and made his way to the upper sky.
16. After his father's departure, Kacha cast off his mantle made of the
bark and leaves of trees; when his frail body appeared out of it like
the clear autumnal sky, after the setting of the sun and the stars of
heaven.
17. He then removed to another forest, where he took shelter in the
cave of a rock, that defended him from rains and rainy clouds, as the
autumnal sky protects the landscape from the floods of rain.
18. He lived afterwards all apart on one side of a wood, with his naked
body and tranquil and vacant mind, and breathed only the breath of his
life; and as he was afflicted on one occasion in this state of his body
and mind, he happened to see his father standing before him.
19. The pious son rose from his seat, and did reverence to his sire
with all the marks of filial piety; being then clasped in his close
embrace, he asked him in his faltering words as follows:--
20. Kacha said:--Behold my father how I have forsaken every thing,
and have even cast away my ragged wrapper and my shelter of reeds and
weeds; and yet why is that I do not find my rest in my god, and what
must I yet do to attain to that state.
21. Brihaspati said:--I told you my son, to forsake your all, and
this all means the mind, which comprehends all things in it; it is by
forsaking your mind that you can gain your perfect felicity, because
the learned know the mind to be all in all, on account of its being the
container of every thing in itself, and there being nothing, besides
the ideas of them in our minds.
22. Vasishtha related:--Saying so, the lord of speech--Brihaspati
flew hastily into the sky; and his son Kacha, strove henceforth to
relinquish the thoughts and operations of his mind.
23. But as found it impossible to subdue his mind, as also to suppress
its action and motion; he then recalled his father to his mind, and
thought in himself to be got into his presence.
24. He considered in himself, the mind to be no part of his body, nor
anything among the known categories in nature; It is quite aloof and
apart from all, and therefore perfectly guiltless in itself, why should
I then abandon so innocent and constant a companion of mine.
25. I shall therefore have recourse to my father, to learn how and why
the mind is accounted as the greatest enemy of men. Learning this fully
from him, I will forthwith forsake it from me, and purchase my felicity
thereby.
26. Vasishtha related:--Having thought so, Kacha went upward to the
upper sky, and meeting the lord of speech there, he bowed down to him,
and did his homage with filial love and affection.
27. He then called him aside, and asked him to tell him the true nature
and form of the mind, so that he could be enabled to detect it thereby,
and forsake it accordingly from him.
28. Brihaspati answered:--The mind is known as the egoism of a man,
by men acquainted with the mental science or psychology; the inward
feeling of one's egoism, takes the name of his mind and no more.
29. Kacha rejoined and said:--O sire of unlimited understanding, that
art the preceptor of thirty-three millions of gods; explain to me this
intricate point of identity of the mind or intellect or egoism.
30. I see the difficulty both of forsaking his mind, as also of
his forgetting his egoism or self-personality; and own also the
impossibility of one's consummation, without his relinquishing both
of these; tell me now, O thou greatest of yogi thinkers, how is it
possible to get rid of them in any wise.
31. Brihaspati answered:--Why my son, the demolition of our egoism
is as easy as the twinkling of our eyelids, and easier far than the
crushing of flowers; and there is not the least pain in your rejecting
this feeling.
32. Now hear my boy tell you how this is to be done in a trice, and how
it is to be removed like long standing bias of ignorance, by the true
knowledge of the nature of a thing.
33. There is no such thing in reality my son, as what you call your
egoism or personality; it is an unreality appearing as reality, and
a false chimera like the ghost of little boys. (Men fear death as
children fear to go in the dark, thinking there are ghost and goblins
lurking therein of Bacon's Essays).
34. Like the fallacy of water in the mirage, and the mistake of a
serpent in the rope; and alike all other errors appearing as truths,
the misconception of egoism is a mere delusion of the understanding.
35. As it is the delusion of our vision, that represents a couple of
moons in the sky, and shows many things as their doubles; so it is
the error of our understanding that presents to us our false egoism,
instead of the one real and everlasting ego.
36. There is one real Ego alone, which is without beginning and
end, and quite pellucid in itself; it is more transparent than the
clear atmosphere, and an Intelligence that knows all things. (Pure
omniscience).
37. He is always every where, as the light of all things and the life
of all living beings; It is his essence only that spreads throughout
all nature and shines in all her phenomena, as the same essence of
water, displays itself in all the rolling surges and waves and moving
bubbles in the sea.
38. Such being the case, tell me what is this special egoism of ours,
and how and whence could a separate personality come to exist; where
can you find dust to raise from water, or behold water to spring from
fire. (Things of the same kind spring from the same source, and the
product is never different from the original).
39. Shun my son your false belief of the difference of this one and
that another, and thyself a quite another person (a tertium quid); and
abstain to think thyself as a mean and contemptible being confined
within the limits of space and time. (_i.e._ Know thyself as identic
with the boundless and everlasting spirit and no other).
40. Know thyself (soul) as unbounded by space and time, and ever
overspread all over in thy essential transparency, which is always the
same in all seeming varieties, the one invariable, pure and simple
Intellect.
41. Thyself (soul) is situated, in the fruits, flowers and leaves of
all the trees on every side of thee; and abides in every thing like the
pith and marrow for its subsistence, and as moisture for its growth.
The pure intellect eternally inheres in every thing as its soul and
essence, tell me then O Kacha, whence you derive the belief of your
egoism and personal existence (as an embodied person).