Purusha reaps the fruits in that very body without break in which it
acquires _karma_, but that body is the Linga Sarira, inclusive of Manas.
As in dream man works out the impressions of the wakeful state without
changing the body, so he enjoys the fruits of _karma_ created in one
birth in the Karma-made body of another birth.
And the doer of Karma is verily the Manas and not the Sthula body.
"These are mine," "I am so and so," only such concepts of the mind
produce re-birth, and not anything in the Sthula body. So the mind sows
and the mind reaps. The body is merely the vehicle of birth producing
thoughts.
This is in answer to the first question. Now to the second.
How do you know there is chitta or mind? All the senses are at one and
the same time in contact with the objects of all the senses. But still
you perceive only one thing at a time. Hence you infer the existence of
the mind. Similarly by marking the tendencies of the mind their
connection with a former birth is inferred. Otherwise why should there
be one mental affection at a time and not another?
Then, in this life you never realise a thing which you never heard or
saw or felt before. How can the mind then reproduce matters you never
experienced before?
The mind by its present characteristics gives an insight into the past
as well as into the future.
It sometimes happens that things are perceived in the mind with strange
combinations in time, space and action, as in dream.
But men are endowed with mind and the mind perceives one after another
the objects of the senses in an enormous variety, and the perceptions
are lost again. So (in the long run) not one experience is altogether
strange.
(For instance, a man sees in dream that he is a king. He must have been
a king in some birth or other. The present combination in the dream is
untrue but not so the kingly experience. The experience is always true
with reference to some time, some space, some action or other).
When the mind is intensely Satvic (calm, pure and transparent) and
becomes constantly devoted to Bhagavan, the whole universe is reflected
on it.
In Jiva there is never a break in the egoistic experience as long as the
Linga Sarira continues.
There is only a seeming break in sleep, swoon and-deep distress such as
death and fatal illness, but such break is due to a collapse of the
perceiving senses.
There is similarly a break in the foetal stage and in extreme childhood.
But such break is due to imperfection of the senses; The moon though not
visible on the new moon night does still exist.
The connection with gross objects does not cease because there is a
temporary absence of such objects. For, are not thoughts about objects
potent in their effects in dream?
The Linga Sarira, consisting in their essence of the five pure elements
(Tanmatra), subject to the three Gunas, extending over the sixteen
transformations (of the Sankhya category), permeated with consciousness,
is called Jiva.
It is with this Ling Sarira that Purusha enters into a body or comes out
of it, and it is with this Sarira that he experiences joy, sorrow, fear,
misery and happiness.
As the leech has its hold on the first blade of grass till it connects
itself with another, so the Jiva identifies itself with one body till it
enters another.
Manas only acquires _karma_ by its contemplation of the objects of the
senses. The bondage is thus created by Avidya.
Therefore do thou meditate on Hari to free thyself from all worldly
attachments and to be fixed in Him for ever.