DESCRIPTION OF INSOUCIANCE.
Argument. On the Abandonment of worldly desires, as conducive to the
composure of the Mind, and society of the good, accompanied with
rationality and spiritual knowledge, constituting the _Samádhi_ of the
soul.
Vasishtha continued:—Blessed are the virtuous, who have cleansed their
hearts from the dirt of ignorance; and victorious are those heroes, who
have conquered their insatiable and ungovernable minds.
2. It is self-control or the government of one’s own mind, that is the
only means of wading through all the troubles and distresses, and
amidst all the dangers and difficulties of this world.
3. Hear the summary of all knowledge, and retain and cultivate
constantly it in your mind; that the desire of enjoyment (avarice) is
our bondage in the world, and its abandonment is our release from it.
4. What need is there of many precepts, learn this one truth as the sum
substance of all, that all pleasures are poisonous and pernicious, and
you must fly from them as from venomous snakes and a raging fire.
5. Consider well and repeatedly in yourself, that all sensible objects
are as hydras and dragons; and their enjoyment is gall and poison.
Avoid them at a distance and pursue after your lasting good.
6. The cupidinous mind is productive of pernicious evils, as the
sterile ground is fertile only in thorns and brambles. (The vitiated
mind brings forth but vice, as the vicious heart teems with guilt).
7. The mind devoid of desire, lacks its expansion, as the heart wanting
its passions and affections, is curbed and contracted in itself.
8. The goodly disposed mind ever teems with virtues, that are opposed
to wrong acts and vice, as the ground of a good quality, grows only the
good and useful trees in spite of weeds and bushes.
9. When the mind gains its serenity by culture of good qualities, the
mist of its errors and ignorance gradually fade and fly away, like
clouds before the rising sun.
10. The good qualities coming to shine in the sphere of the mind, like
stars in the moonlight sky, gives rise to the luminary of reason to
shine over it, like the bright sun of the day.
11. And as the practice of patience grows familiar in the mind, like
the medicinal _vansa-lochana_ within the bamboo; it gives rise to the
quality of firmness in the man, as the moon brightens the vernal sky.
12. The society of the good is an arbour, affording its cooling shade
of peace, and yielding the fruit of salvation. Its effect in righteous
men, is like that of the stately _sarala_-tree, distilling the juice of
spiritual joy from the fruitage of samádhi (sang-froid).
13. Thus prepared, the mind becomes devoid of its desires and enmity,
and is freed from all troubles and anxieties. It becomes obtuse to the
feelings of grief and joy, and of pain and pleasure also, and all its
restlessness dies in itself.
14. Its doubts in the truths of the scriptures die away, as the
ephemerides and all its curiosities for novelties, are put to a stop. Its
veil of myths and fictions is unveiled, and its ointment of error is
rubbed out of it.
15. Its attempts and efforts, malice and disdain, distress and disease,
are all removed from it; and the mist of its grief and sorrow, and the
chain of affections, are all blown and torn away.
16. It discards the progeny of its doubts, repudiates the consorts of
its avarice, and breaks loose from the prison-house of its body. It
then seeks the welfare of the soul, and attains its godly state of
holiness.
17. It abandons the causes of its stoutness (_i.e._ its nourishments
and enjoyments), and relinquishes its choice of this thing and that;
and then remembering the dignity of the soul, it casts off the covering
of its body as a straw.
18. The elevation of the mind in worldly affairs, tends to its
destruction, and its depression in these leads to its spiritual
elevation. The wise always lower their minds (pride); but fools are for
elevating them (to their ruin).
19. The mind makes the world its own, and ranges all about it; it
raises the mountains and mounts over them; it is as the infinite
vacuum, and comprehends all vacuity in itself; and it makes gods of
friends and foes of others unto us.
20. The understanding being soiled by doubts, and forgetting the true
nature of the intellect, takes upon it the name of the mind, when it is
full of all its worldly desires.
21. And the intellect being perverted by its various desires, is called
the living soul; the animal soul being distinct from the rational soul.
22. The understanding which forgets its intellectuality, and falls into
the error of its own personality, is what we call the internal
principle of the mind which is all hollow within.
23. The soul is not the man of the world (_i.e._ no worldly being), nor
is it the body or its blood. All material bodies are but gross and dull
matter; but the soul in the body is empty air and intangible.
24. The body being dissected into atoms, and analysed in all its
particles, presents nothing but blood and entrails as the plantain
tree, which when cut into pieces, presents naught but its folded rinds.
25. Know the mind and living soul as making a man, and assuming his
mortal form; the mind takes its form by itself according to his own
option.
26. Man stretches his own sphere of action by his own option only to
entrap himself in it, as the silkworm weaves its cocoon for its own
imprisonment.
27. The soul lays down its error of being the body, when it has to
forsake the same at some time or other (_i.e._ sooner or later), and
assume another form as the germ sprouts forth into leaves. (_i.e._ The
body is not the soul, nor is the soul the same with the body, as the
materialist would have it; because the soul has its transmigration,
which the body has not).
28. As is the desire or thought in the mind, so is it born in its next
state of metempsychosis. Hence the new born babe is given to sleeping,
because it thinks itself to be dead, and lying in the night-time of his
death. It is also given to the dreaming of those things, which had been
the objects of its desire or thought in its previous state or birth.
(This establishes the doctrine of innate ideas in the dreaming state of
new-born babies).
29. So sour becomes sweet by mixture with sugar, and the bitter seed
produces sweet fruits by being sown with honey. So on the contrary,
sweet becomes bitter by intermixture of gall and wormwood. (This is a
fact in horticulture.—Áráma Sástra, and applies to the goodness and
badness of the human mind, according to its good and bad associations).
30. Aiming after goodness and greatness, makes a man good and great; as
one wishing to be an Indra or a lord, dreams of his lordliness in his
sleep. (The mind makes the man).
31. Inclination to meanness bemeans a man, and a tendency to vileness
vilifies his conduct in life; as one deluded by his fancy of devils,
comes to see their apparitions in his nightly visions.
32. But what is naturally foul or fair, can hardly turn otherwise at
any time; as the limpid lake never becomes muddy, nor the dirty pool
ever becomes glassy. (Nature of a thing is unchangeable).
33. The perverted mind produces the fruits of its perversion in all its
actions, while puremindedness is fraught with the effects of its purity
everywhere.
34. Good and great men never forsake their goodness and greatness, even
in their fall and decline; so the glorious sun fills the vault of
heaven with his glory, even when he is sinking below (the horizon).
35. There is no restriction or freedom of the human soul, to or from
any action or thing herein; it is a mere passive and neutral
consciousness, of all that passes before it as a magic scene.
36. The world is a magical city, and as a mirage appearing to sight; it
is of the nature of the delusive panorama, showing many moons of the
one, whose unity admits of no duality. So the one Brahma is represented
as many by delusion. (The Hindus, contrary to Europeans, have many suns
but one moon. Escas—Chandra).
37. All this is verily the essence of Brahma, and this is the sober
reality; the substantive world is an unsubstantiality, and peers out to
view as a hollow phantom. (It is a phantasmagoria of phantasms).
38. That I am not the infinite but an infinitesimal, is the misjudgment
of the ignorant; but the certitude of my infinity and supremacy, is the
means of my absorption in the Infinite and Supreme.
39. The belief of one’s individuality in his undivided, all pervasive
and transparent soul, as “I am this,” is the cause of his bondage to
his personality, and is a web spun by his erroneous dualism. (Knowledge
of a separate existence apart from solity, amounts to a dualistic
creed).
40. Want of the knowledge of one’s bondage or freedom, and of his unity
or duality, and his belief in the totality of Brahma, is the supreme
truth of true philosophy.
41. Perfect transparency of the soul, amounting to its nihility, and
its want of attachment to visible appearances, as also its
unmindfulness of all that is, are the conditions for beholding Brahma
in it. There is no other way to this.
42. The purity of the mind produced by acts of holiness, is the
condition for receiving the sight of Brahma; as it is the whiteness of
the cloth that can receive any colour upon it.
43. Think thy soul, O Ráma! as same with the souls of all other
persons, and abstain from all other thoughts, of what is desirable or
undesirable, what invigorates or enfeebles the body, and what brings
liberation after bondage, or Salvation after sinfulness. (Since none of
these states appertains to the universal soul, which is quite free from
them).
44. The mirror of the mind being cleansed by the knowledge of the
sástras, and dispassionateness of the understanding, it receives the
reflexion of Brahma, as the clear crystal reflects the images of things.
45. The sight which is conversant with visible objects and not with
images and ideas in the mind, is called false vision of what is soon
lost from view. (_i.e._ Mental sight is more lasting than that of the
visual organs).
46. When the mind is fixed upon God, by abstracting its sight from all
mental and ocular visions, it has then the view of the Supreme before
it. (This is called spiritual vision).
47. The visible sights which are obvious to view, are all but unreal
phantoms; it is the absorption of the mind in the Divine, that makes it
identical with the same and no other.
48. The visibles now present before us being absent from our view,
either before or after our sight of them, must be considered as absent
in the interim also. Therefore one unacquainted with his mind, is as
insensible as the man that knows not what he holds in his hand.
49. One having no knowledge that “the world is the same with the
Supreme spirit,” is always subject to misery; but the negation of the
visibles as distinct from God, gives us both the pleasure of our
enjoyments here, and our liberation in future.
50. It is ignorance to say the water is one thing and its wave is
another; but it shows one’s intelligence, who says they are the one and
the same thing.
51. The vanities of the world, are fraught with sorrow, therefore
discard all its appendages from thee. The abandonment of superfluity,
will conduce to thy attainment of wisdom at last.
52. The mind being composed of vain desires, is an unreality in itself;
say therefore, O Ráma! why should you sorrow for something which in
reality is nothing.
53. Do you, O Ráma! look upon all things as traps set to ensnare the
soul; and regard them with the eye of an unkind kinsman looking upon
his relatives, with an eye of apathy and unconcern.
54. As the unkind relative is unconcerned with the joys and griefs of
his relations; so shouldst thou remain aloof from all things, by
knowing the falsehood of their natures.
55. Rely on that eternal Spirit, which is infinite knowledge and
felicity, and which is between the viewer and the view (_i.e._ betwixt
the noumenon and the phenomenon). The mind being fixed to that truth,
will adhere to it as clay, after the swiftness of its flight is at an
end.
56. The airy flight of the mind being restrained, the sluggish body
must cease to run about; and the cloud of the dust of ignorance, will
no more spread over the city of the world.
57. When the rains of our desires are over, and the calmness of the
mind is restored; when the shuddering coldness of dulness has fled,
and when the mud of worldliness is dried up:—
58. When the channel of our thirst is dried up, and the drinking pots
are sucked up and emptied; when the forest of the heart is cleared, and
its brambles are rooted out, and the frost of false knowledge has
disappeared:—
59. It is then that the mist of error vanishes from view, like the
shadow of night on the approach of dawn; and the frigidity of dullness
is put to flight, like the poison of snake-bite by the potent charm of
mantras.
60. Then the rivulets of our desires, do not run down the rock of the
body; nor do the peacocks of our fleeting wishes, fly and sport on its
top.
61. The sphere of our consciousness becomes as the clear sky; and the
luminary of the living soul, shines as brightly over it as the midday
sun.
62. The cloud of error is dispelled and succeeded by the light of
reason; and the longings of the soul, being purified of their dross,
make it shine brilliantly amidst its sphere.
63. Then raptures of serene delight, shoot forth in the soul like
blooming blossoms in the open air; and a cool light is shed upon it,
like the cooling beams of the autumnal moon.
64. This ecstacy of the soul, unfolds all prosperity before it, and
fructifies with abundance the well cultivated ground of the reasoning
mind. (Truth is the fruit of holy joy in the reasonable mind).
65. It sheds its clear lustre all over the world, and shows the depths
of the hills and forests, and everything on earth in their clearest
light. (Heavenly joy unfolds all things to light).
66. It expands the mind and makes it translucent, and the heart as a
clear lake, renders blooming with blossoms of the lotus of _satva_, and
without the dust—_rajas_ of egoism. It is never infested by the
swarming passions of pride or _tamas_.
67. The mind then being purged of its selfishness, turns to universal
benevolence and philanthropy; and being quite calm in itself without
any desire of its own, it reigns as lord over the city of its body.
68. The man whose investigation has made him acquainted with all
things, whose soul is enlightened with truth; whose mind is melted down
from his highmindedness; who is calm and quiet in his understanding,
and looks at the unpleasant course of the births and deaths of men with
pity; he verily lives happily in the realm of his body, without his
feverish anxieties about anything.