SERMON ON THE SUPERIOR SORT OF YOGA MEDITATION.
Argument:—Mistake of the action of the Intellect in the action of
the mind, as the cause of the phenomenal world; and the removal
of this error of the mind, as the cause of the intellectual peace
and rest in its real state.
Vasishtha continued:—Be dead to your sensibility, and retain the
tranquility of your soul, by conforming with whatsoever thou gettest or
is meted out to thy lot; or else the fair (order of nature and ordinance
of God), will appear as foul, as a pure crystal shows itself as black in
the shade.
2. All and every thing being contained in the only one, all extended
soul, we can not conceive how the conception of variety or multiplicity
can rise from the unity. (To Him no high, no low, no great, no small; He
fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all. Pope).
3. The category of the intellect is entirely of a vacuous nature, and
having neither its beginning nor end; and is neither produced nor
destroyed, with the production and destruction of the body. (And though
it is diffused all over the body and its various powers and senses, yet
there is variation of its own essence. Gloss).
4. All insensible and material bodies, are moved by the miraculous power
of the intellect or mind; which being unmoved of itself gives motion to
bodies, as the still waters of the sea gives rise to the waves. (Here
the intellect is explained as the mind in the gloss).
5. As it is an error to suppose a sheet of cloth in a cloud, so the
supposition of egoism in the body, is altogether erroneous: (since one’s
personality consists in the soul and not in the person).
6. Do not rely in the unreal body, which is of this world, and grows to
perish in it; but depend on the real essence of the endless spirit, for
thy everlasting happiness (in both worlds).
7. The vacuous intellect, is the essential property of the immortal
soul; this is the transcendent reality in nature, and may this
super-excellent entity be thy essence likewise.
8. If you are certain of this truth, you become as glorious as that
essence also; because the deep meditator loses himself in the meditated
object, in his intense meditation of the same. (This assimilation of the
_triputi_ or triple condition of the thinker and his act and object of
thought in one, is the meaning and main end of the yoga meditation of
union).
9. The triple condition of the viewer, view and act of viewing, are the
three properties of the one and same intellect; and there is nothing
which is any other than (or not the same with) the knowledge thereof, as
there is no thought unlike the act of its thinking. (This shows the
agreement of the cause, its causation and effect).
10. The soul is ever calm and clear and uniform in its nature, it does
not rise and fall like the tides by the lunar influence, nor is it
soiled like the sea waters by tempestuous winds. (The soul is ever
unruffled at any event).
11. As a passenger in a boat beholds the rocks and trees on the bank to
be in motion, and as one thinks a shell or conch to be composed of
silver; so the mind mistakes the body for reality, (which in truth is an
unreal appearance).
12. As the sight of the material dismisses the view of the intellectual,
so doth intellectuality discard the belief of the material; and so the
knowledge of the living soul being resolved in the supreme soul, there
remains nothing at last, except the unity of the all pervading spirit.
13. The knowledge that all this (world), is quite calm and quiet (in its
nature); and the whole is an evolution of the divine spirit, takes away
the belief in everything else, which is naught but the product of error
and illusion.
14. As there is no forest in the sky, nor moisture in the sands; and as
there is no fire in the disk of the moon, so there is no material body
in the sight of the mind. (Mentally considered, there is no matter).
15. Ráma fear not for this world—the mere creation of thy error, and
without its real existence whatsoever, know this transcendent truth, O
thou best amongst the inquirers of truth, that this world is a nullity
and void.
16. Your mistake of the existence of the visible world, and the
disbelief which you fostered with regard to the entity of the invisible
soul, must have been removed this day by my preaching, say now what
other cause there may be of your bondage in this world.
17. As a plate, water-pot and any other earthenware, is no more than the
earth (of which it is made); so the outer world is no other than the
inner thought of the mind, and it wears away under the power of
reasoning.
18. Whether exposed to danger and difficulty, or placed in prosperity or
adversity, or betided by affluence or penury; you must preserve, O Ráma,
your even disposition amidst the consciousness (or knowledge) of your
joy and grief; be gladly free from the knowledge of your egoism, and
remain as you are sedate by your nature, and without your subjection in
any state.
19. Remain Ráma, as thou art, like the moon in the sphere of thy race,
with thy full knowledge of everything in nature; avoid thy joy and grief
at every occurrence, and give up thy desire and disgust for anything in
the world. Do so or as you may choose for yourself.