VITUPERATION OF YOUTH.
Ráma continued:—
The boy having passed his state of blemishes, gladly steps to his youth
with hopes of gaining his objects that tend only to his ruin.
2. The insensible youth feels at this time the wanton inclinations of
his loose mind, and goes on falling from one tribulation to another.
3. He is overcome as one subdued by the power of delusive Cupid, lying
hidden in the cavity of the heart (hence called _Manoja_).
4. His ungoverned mind gives rise to loose thoughts like those of
voluptuous women, and these serve to beguile him like the magic
collyrium (in the hand) of boys (called _Siddhánjana_).
5. Vices of the most heinous kind betake persons of such (perverse)
minds in their youth, and lead them to their ruin.
6. The paths of youth lead them to the gate of hell through a maze of
errors. Those that have been left uncorrupt by their youth, are not to
be corrupted by anything else.
7. Whoso has passed the dreadfully enchanted coast of youth, fraught
with various flavours and wonders, are said to be truly wise.
8. I take no delight in our unwelcome youth, which appears to us in the
form of a momentary flash of lightning, and soon succeeded by the loud
roaring of the clouds (of manhood).
9. Youth like rich wine is sweet and delicious (at first), but becomes
bitter, insipid and noxious in a short time. Hence it is not delectable
to me.
10. Youth appearing (at first) as a reality, is found to be a false,
transient thing, as deceptive as a fairy dream by night. Hence I like
it not.
11. It is the most charming of all things to men, but its charm is soon
lost and fled. Therefore the phantasmagoria of youth is not pleasing to
me.
12. Youth as an arrow-shot is pleasant to see, but painful to feel
its smart. Hence I do not like youth that produces blood heat (in the
veins).
13. Youth as a harlot is charming at first sight, but turning heartless
soon after. Hence it is not to my liking.
14. As the efforts of a dying man are all for his torment, so the
exertions of the young are portentous of his destruction.
15. Puberty advances as a dark night spreading the shadow of
destruction. It darkens the heart and mind by its hedious appearance,
and intimidates even the god (Siva himself).
16. Errors growing in youth, cause copious mistakes in life, by
upsetting good sense and setting at naught the approved good manners
(of society).
17. The raging fire in the hearts of the young, caused by separation of
their mates, burns them down like trees by a wild fire.
18. As a clear, sacred and wide stream, becomes muddy in the rains, so
doth the mind of man however clear, pure and expanded it may be, gets
polluted in his youth.
19. It is possible for one to cross over a river made terrible by its
waves, but no way possible to him to get over the boisterous expanse of
his youthful desires.
20. O how (lamentably) is one’s youth worn out with the thoughts of
his mistress, her swollen breasts, her beautiful face and her sweet
caresses.
21. The young man afflicted with the pain of soft desire, is regarded
by the wise in no better light than a fragment of (useless) straw.
22. Youth is the stake of haughty self-esteem, as the rack is for the
immolation of the elephant giddy with its frontal pearl.
23. Youth is a lamentable forest, where the mind as the root of all,
gives growth to jungles of (love sick) groans and sighs, and tears of
sorrow. The vices of this time, are as venomous snakes of the forest.
24. Know youthful bloom of the person to resemble the blooming lotus of
the lake:—the one is full of affections, bad desires and evil intents,
as the other is fraught with bees, filaments, petals and leaves.
25. The new bloom of youth is the resort of anxiety and disease, which
like two birds with their (black and white) plumage of vice and virtue,
frequent the fountain of the young man’s heart.
26. Early youth resembles a deep sea, disturbed by the waves of
numberless amusements, transgressing all bounds, and regardless of
death and disease.
27. Youth is like a furious gust of wind, over-loaded with the dust of
pride and vanity, and sweeps away every trace of the good qualities
(early acquired by one).
28. The rude dust of the passions of youths, disfigures their face,
and the hurricane of their sensualities cover their good qualities (as
flying leaves overspread the ground).
29. Youthful vigour awakens a series of faults, and destroys a group of
good qualities, by increasing the vice of pleasures.
30. Youthful bloom confines the fickle mind to some beauteous person,
as the bright moon-beams serve to shut the flitting bee in the dust of
the closing lotus.
31. Youth like a delightsome cluster of flowers, growing in the arbour
of human body, attracts the mind as the bee to it, and makes it giddy
(with its sweets).
32. The human mind anxious to derive pleasure from the youthfulness of
the body, falls into the cave of sensuality, as a deer running after
the mirage of desert heat, falls down into a pit.
33. I take no delight in moony youth, which guilds the dark body with
its beams, and resembles the stern mane of the leonine mind. It is a
surge in the ocean of our lives (that tosses us all about).
34. There is no reliance in youth, which fades away as soon as summer
flowers in this desert of the body.
35. Youth is as a bird, and as soon flies away from our bodily cage as
the philosopher’s stone, which quickly disappears from the hands of the
unfortunate.
36. As youth advances to its highest pitch, so the feverish passions
wax stronger for our destruction only.
37. As long as the night (delusion) of youth does not come to its end,
so long the fiends of our passion do not cease to rage in the desert of
the body.
38. Pity me, O sage! in this state of youth, which is so full of
perturbations, as to have deprived me of the sight (light) of reason. O
pity me as thou wouldst for thy dying son.
39. The foolish man who ignorantly rejoices at his transient youth, is
considered as a human beast.
40. The foolish fellow who is fond of his youth which is flushed with
pride and fraught with errors, comes to repent (of his folly) in a
short time.
41. Those great minded men are honoured on earth, who have safely
passed over the perils of youth.
42. One crosses over with ease the wide ocean which is the horrible
habitation of huge whales; but it is hard to pass over our youth, that
is so full of vices and the billows (of our passions).
43. It is very rare to have that happy youth which is fraught with
humility, and spent in the company of respectable men; which is
distinguished by feelings of sympathy, and is joined with good
qualities and virtues.