SERMON ON HOLY MEDITATION.
Argument:—Necessity of discharging our social duties, as
they occur unto us at any time: and that of conducting our
contemplation in solitude.
Vasishtha continued to say:—Remain always to look inwardly in thyself,
by being freed from the feelings of passion and desire, continue in the
performance of thy actions every where, but reflect always upon the
quiet and spotless intellect within thyself.
2. The mind which is as clear as the open sky, and is full of knowledge
and settled in the divine intellect; which is ever even and graceful and
replete with joy, is said to be highly favoured of heaven and expanded
by Brahma.
3. Whether be taken by pain and grief, or exposed to dangers and
difficulties, or attended by pleasure or prosperity, in a greater or
less degree.
4. In whatever place and in whatsoever state thou art placed, bear with
thy afflictions with an unsorrowful heart; and whether thou weepest or
criest, or becomest a play of opposite circumstances, be joyous in both
for both are meant for thy good.
5. You are delighted in the company of your consorts, and feel joyous at
the approach of festivity and prosperity; and it is because you are
tempted like ignorant people, by your fond desire of pleasure.
6. Fools that are allured by their greediness of gain, meet with their
fate in hazardous exploits and warfare; and it is fit that they should
burn with the fire of their desire, like straws consumed in a
conflagration.
7. Earn money by honest means and with the circumspection of a crane, in
whatever chance presents itself before thee; and do not run in pursuit
of gain, like the ignorant rabble.
8. O thou destroyer of thy foes, drive away by force all thy desires as
the greatest enemies, and as winds of heaven drive afar the rainless and
empty clouds of the sky.
9. Be tolerant, O Ráma, towards the ignorant people, that are led away
by their desires and deserve thy pity; be reverent of highminded men,
and delighted in thyself by observing the taciturnity of thy speech, and
without being misled by thy desires like the ignorant mob.
10. Congratulate with joy and sympathise with sorrow, (whether of
thyself or others); pity the sorrows of the poor, and be valiant among
the brave.
11. Turn your eyes into your heart, and be always joyous by communing
with yourself (or soul); and then whatever you do with a liberal mind,
you are not to answer for the same as its agent.
12. By remaining fixed in the meditation of your soul, and by having
your eyes always turned within yourself; you shall be invulnerable even
at the stroke of a thunderbolt (darted by the hand of Indra). So saith
the sruti:—The Gods have no power to hurt the holy. _Tasya hana deváscha
ná bhútya ishate._
13. He is said to be master of himself, who is freed from the delusion
of desire, and lives retired in the cave of his consciousness; who is
attached to his own soul and acts at his own will, and has his delight
in his very self. (Because says the sruti—Whoso goes out of himself,
loses his very self).
14. No weapon can wound the self-possest man, nor fire can chafe his
soul; no moisture can damp the spirit, nor the hot winds can dry it up.
(No elemental influence can prevail on the spiritual soul).
15. Lay hold on the firm pillar of your soul, which is unborn or
increate, undecaying and immortal; adhere steadfastly to thy soul, as
one clings to the prop or column of his house.
16. The world is an arbor, and all things in it are as the flowers of
this tree; our knowledge of all things, is as the fragrance of these
flowers; but our self-consciousness is the essence of them all;
therefore look internally to this inward essence before you mind the
externals.
17. All outward affairs, are brought about by their inward reflection in
the mind; but it is as hard to bring about a desire into being, as to
raise a stone to life.
18. Get rid of your bodily exertions and lull your mind to sleep; be
doing all your duties, as a tortoise with its contracted limbs. (_i.e._
Act with indifference, and without being moved).
19. Manage thine affairs with a half-sleeping and half awakened mind
(like a waking sleeper); and do thy outward functions (without the
exertion of your mental faculties).
20. As babes are possessed of their innate knowledge, and dumb creatures
are endowed with their instinct, without the feeling of any desire
rising in them; so they live and act with their minds unattached to
anything, and as vacant as the empty air.
21. Remain untroubled and free from care, with entirely sleepy and
comatose mind within thyself; a mind devoid of all its functions and
quite absorbed in itself, and slightly acting on the members of the
body.
22. You may continue to discharge or dispense with your duties
altogether, by impairing your mind with knowledge, and resting quietly
in your pure consciousness, after it is purged from the stain of
appetence.
23. Go on managing your outward affairs in your waking state, as if your
faculties were dormant in sleep; and never hanker to have anything, nor
let go aught that presents itself to thee.
24. If you are dormant when waking, by your inattention to all about
you; so are you awake when sleeping by your trance in the bosom of the
Supreme soul; and when you are in the condition of the union of the two,
you attain to the state of perfect consummation.
25. Thus by your gradual practice of this habit of _insouciance_, you
reach to that state of unity, which has neither its beginning nor end,
and which is beyond all other things.
26. The world is certainly neither a unity nor duality (but is composed
of a plurality in its totality, or the one in many _A han Bahushaym_),
leaving therefore the inquiry into its endless varieties, resort to your
Supreme bliss, with a mind as clear as the translucent sphere of empty
air.
27. Ráma rejoined:—If it be so, O great sage! (That there is no ego or
tu as you say), then tell me, why are we conscious of ourselves, and how
are you sitting here under the name of the sage Vasishtha.
28. Valmíki said:—Being thus interrogated by Ráma, Vasishtha the best of
speakers, remained silent for a moment, pondering on the answer he
should make.
29. This silence of his created some anxiety in the royal audience, and
Ráma too being perplexed in his mind, repeated his question to the sage
and said:—
30. Why sir, are you silent like myself? I see there is no such argument
in the world, which sages like yourself are unable to solve and
expound:—
31. Vasishtha replied:—It is not owing to my inability to speak, nor
want of argument on my part that made me hold my tongue; but it is the
wide scope of your question that withheld me from giving its answer. (Or
from answering to it).
32. Ráma! There are two kinds of querists, namely, the ignorant
inquisitor and the intelligent investigator; and so there are two modes
of argumentation also for them respectively: the simple mode for
simpletons, and the rational form for intelligent and reasonable men.
33. You had been so long, Ráma, ignorant of superior knowledge, and fit
to be taught in ordinary equivocal language.
34. But now you have become a connoisseur of superior truth, and found
your rest in the state of supreme felicity; and are no longer to benefit
by the ambiguous language of common speech.
35. Whenever a good speaker wishes to deliver an eloquent speech,
whether it be a long or short one, or relate to some abstruse or
spiritual subject (he must satisfy himself first).
36. The ego being the counterpart or privation of all representation, is
inexpressible by representative sounds and words; and being beyond the
predicaments of number and other categories, is not predicable by any of
them or other fiction of fancy. It is the totality of all, as light is
composed of innumerable particles of ray.
37. It is not right, O Ráma, that one who has known the truth (the
gnostic), should give an imperfect or defective answer to a question
(proposed to him). But what can he do, when no language is perfect or
free from defect, as you know it well.
38. It is right, O Ráma, that I who know the truth, should declare it as
it is to my pupils; and the knower of abstract truth is known to remain
as mute as a block of wood, and the soundness of whose mind is hard to
sound. (So says the Persian mystic:—He who has known the unknowable, has
become unknown to himself and others).
39. It is want of self-cogitation that causes one to speak, (_i.e._
unsoundness of thought sounds in high sounding words); but they hold
their silence who know the Supreme excellence; and this is the best
answer that is given thy inquiry into this truth.
40. Every man, O Ráma, speaks of himself as he is (or thinks himself to
be); but I am only my conscious self, which is unspeakable in its
nature, and appertains to the unbespeakable one.
41. How can that thing admit the application of a definite term to give
it expression, which is inexpressible by words (and beyond our
conception); I cannot therefore express the inexpressible by words. I
have already said, all are but fictitious signs: (representative of our
certain ideas).
42. Ráma rejoined:—You sir, that disregard every thing that is expressed
by words, and regard these as imperfect and defective symbols of their
originals; must tell me now, what you mean by your “privation of
representation” and what you are yourself.[1]
43. Vasishtha replied:—It being so (that there no determinate person
expressed by the word egoism); hear me to tell you now, O Ráma, that art
the best among the enquirers of truth, what thou art and what am I in
truth, and what is world in reality.
44. This Ego, my boy, is the empty intellect and imperishable in its
nature; it is neither conceivable nor knowable, and is beyond all
imagination.
45. I am the clear air of the intellect, and so art thou the empty sky
also; the whole world is an entire vacuity, and there is nothing else
except an everlasting and infinite vacuum (beom) every where.
46. The soul is identic with pure knowledge, it is free from sensational
knowledge, and beyond the conscious knowledge of others. I cannot call
it anything otherwise than the self or soul.
47. Yet it is the fashion of disputants in order to maintain their own
ground, or for the salvation of their pupils to multiply the egoism of
the one soul, and to distribute it into a thousand branches.
48. When a living soul remains calm and quiet notwithstanding the
management of its worldly affairs; and is as motionless as a living
carcass, it is said to have attained its perfect state.
49. This state of perfection consists in refraining from external
exercise and devotion, and persistence in continual meditation; feeling
no sensation of pain or pleasure, and being unconscious of one’s
self-existence, and the co-existence of all others besides.
50. Freedom from egoism and the consciousness of all other existence,
brings on the idea of a total inexistence and emptiness, which is
altogether beyond thought and meditation. (For none can think of a
nothing). All attempt to grasp a nullity, is as vain as a blind man’s
desire to see a picture.
51. The posture of sitting unmoved as a stone, at the shocks and turn
backs (or drakes and ducks) of fortune; is verily the state of _nirvána_
or deathless coma of a sensible being. (The figures of saints are as
unmoved as statues).
52. This state of saintly anaesthesia is not marked by others, nor
perceived by the saint himself; because the knowing sage shuns the
society of men in disgust, and is enlightened with his spiritual
knowledge within himself.
53. In this state of spiritual light, the sage loses sight of his egoism
and tuism and all others and beholds the only one unity, in which he is
extinct and absorbed in pure and unsullied felicity.
54. It is the intellection of the intellect, that is said to be
conversant with the intelligibles (or the operation of the subjective
soul on the objective); this is the cause of the creation of the world,
which is the cause of our bondage and continual woes (in our repeated
births and deaths).
55. It is said to be the dormancy or insensibility of intellection, when
it is not employed about the intelligible objects; it is then called the
supremely calm and quiet state of liberation (both for thought and
action); and is free from decay.
56. The soul being in its state of peaceful tranquility, its ideas of
space and time fly from it like clouds in autumn; and then it has no
thought of anything else for want of its power of thinking.
57. When the sight of the soul is turned inwards (_antar mukha_) as in
sleep, it sees the world of its desires rising before its consciousness
in their aerial forms; but O ye princes, the sight of the soul being
directed to the outside (_bahir mukha_), as in its waking state, it
views the inward objects of his desire, presented before its sight in
the gross forms of the outer world. (This passage shows the contrariety
of the spiritual philosophy to the material; the former maintaining the
material world to be a shadow of the ideal, and the latter asserting the
intellectual as a representation of the visible world).
58. The mind, understanding and the other faculties, depend upon the
consciousness of the soul, and are of the same nature as the intellect;
but being considered in their intimate relation with external objects
_bahir-mukhatá_, they are represented as grossly material. (In the
doctrines of materialist—the sánkhya and others).
59. The self-same intellect being spread over our consciousness, of all
internal and external feelings and perceptions; it is in vain to
differentiate this one and undivided power, by the several names (of
spiritual, mental, and bodily faculties).
60. There is nothing which is set apart, from the percipience of the
conscious intellect; which is as pure and all-pervading as the empty
vacuum, and which is said by the learned to be undefinable by words. (So
says the sruti:—No speech can approach to it).
61. Being seen very acutely, the world appears as hazy in the divine
essence, as it were something between a reality and unreality; and
so dost thou appear to sight, as something real and unreal at the
sametime. (All things appear as evanescent shadows in the clear mirror
of the Divine Mind).
62. So am I the empty air, if can be free from desire; and so also art
thou the pure intellect, if thou canst but restrain thy desires.
63. He who is certain of this truth (that he is the intellect), knows
himself in reality; but whoso thinks himself as somebody under a certain
appellation, is far from knowing the truth. Again anyone remaining in
his unreal body, but relying in his intellectuality, is sure to have his
tranquility and salvation. (So the sruti:—Anyone awakened to truth is
sure to be saved, whether he is a God, rishi or sage, or a vile man).
64. Man’s exercise of the intellectual faculty, ameliorates the love of
union with the original intellect by removing the ignorance; as heat of
the fire mixes with the primitive heat, when wind ceases to blow.
65. Living beings who are converted to the state of patient trees and
stones, by _insouciance_ or insensibility of themselves, are said to
have attained their liberation which is free from disturbance, and to be
situated in their state of undecayableness.
66. A man having obtained his wisdom by means of his knowledge, is said
to have become a _muní_ or sage, but growing an ignoramus owing to his
ignorance, he becomes a brute creature, or degraded even lower to some
vegetable life.
67. The knowledge that “I am Brahma” (because I am a man) and this other
is the world (because it is inanimate) is a gross error proceeding from
gross ignorance; but all untruth flies away before investigation, as
darkness vanishes before the advance of light.
68. He is wise who with the perception and actions of his outward
organs, is simply devoid of his inward desires; who does not think or
feel about anything in his mind, and remains quite calm and composed in
his outward appearance.
69. The samádhi-trance of a wise man, is as his sound sleep uninfested
by a dream; and wherein the visibles are all buried within himself, and
when he sees naught but his self or soul.
70. As the blueness of the sky is a false conception of the brain, so
the appearance of the world is a fallacy of the silent soul; they are no
more than mists of error, that obscure the clear and vacuous sphere of
the soul.
71. He is the true sage who though surrounded by the objects of wish, is
still undesirous of any; and knows them all as mere unrealities and
false vanities.
72. Know, O intelligent Ráma, that all objects of desire in this world,
are as marvellous as those seen in our imagination, dream and in the
magic of jugglers; such also are all the objects of our vision, on which
you can place no trust nor reliance.
73. Know also, there is no pain or pleasure, nor any act of merit or
demerit (_i.e._ any moral virtue and vice); nor anything which anybody,
owing to the impossibility of there being any agent or patient (_i.e._
any active or passive agent).
74. The whole (universe) is a vacuum and without any support at all; it
appears as a secondary moon in the sky or a city in one’s dream or
imagination, none of which has its reality in nature.
75. Abide only by the rules of the community, or observe strictly thy
mute taciturnity; and by remaining as a block of wood or stone, be
absolved in the Supreme.
76. The tranquility and intellectuality of the Supreme deity, do not
admit of any diversity in his nature; and his incorporeality does not
admit of the attribution, of a body or any of its parts unto him.
77. There can be no nature whatever, whereof we have any conception,
that can be attributed to the pure spirit (which is free from all stain
and foulness); and this Divine spirit being inherent in all bodies,
there can be no body for its nature ever imputed to him.
78. The existence of consciousness in the uncreated spirit, or in other
words, the existence of a self-conscious eternal Intellect, cannot be
denied of God; according to sophistry of Atheists; for though our
knowledge of recipient and received (_i.e._ of the container and
contained) is very imperfect, yet there is some one at the bottom that
is ever perfect.
79. O Ráma! do you rely in that increate and indestructible Supreme
being, which is ever the same and pure, irrefutable and adored by the
wise and good; it is the irrefutable (_i.e._ demonstrable) verity, on
which you should quietly depend for your liberation. And though you may
eat and drink and play about like all others, yet you must know that all
this is nothing.