Yoga Vasistha (Yoga-Vasishtha Maharamayana)

LAMENTATION OF THE CHANDÁLA WOMAN. Argument. Lavana goes to the Vindhyan region, and sees his consort and relatives of the dreaming state. Vasishtha continued:—Now Ráma, attend to the wonderful power of the said Avidyá or error, in displaying the changeful phenomenals, like the changing forms of ornaments in the substance of the self-same gold. 2. The king Lavana, having at the end of his dream, perceived the falsehood of his vision, resolved on the following day to visit that great forest himself. 3. He said to himself: Ah! when shall I revisit the Vindhyan region, which is inscribed in my mind; and where I remember to have undergone a great many hardships in my forester’s life. 4. So saying, he took to his southward journey, accompanied by his ministers and attendants, as if he was going to make a conquest of that quarter, where he arrived at the foot of the mount in a few days. 5. There he wandered about the southern, and eastern and western shores of the sea (i.e. all round the Eastern and Western Ghats). He was as delighted with his curvilinear course, as the luminary of the day, in his diurnal journey from east to west.

6. He saw there in a certain region, a deep and doleful forest stretching wide along his path, and likening the dark and dismal realms of death (Yama or Pluto). 7. Roving in this region he beheld everything, he had seen before in his dream; he then inquired into the former circumstances, and wondered to learn their conformity with the occurrences of his vision. 8. He recognised there the Chandála hunters of his dream, and being curious to know the rest of the events, he continued in his peregrination about the forest. 9. He then beheld a hamlet at the skirt of the wilderness, foggy with smoke, and appearing as the spot where he bore the name of Pushta Pukkasa or fostered Chandála. 10. He beheld there the same huts and hovels, and the various kinds of human habitations, fields and plains, with the same men and women that dwelt their before. 11. He beheld the same landscapes and leafless branches of trees, shorn of their foliage by the all devouring famine; he saw the same hunters pursuing their chase, and the same helpless orphans lying thereabouts.

12. He saw the old lady (his mother-in-law), wailing at the misfortunes of other matrons; who were lamenting like herself with their eyes suffused in tears, at the untimely deaths and innumerable miseries of their fellow brethren. 13. The old matrons with their eyes flowing with brilliant drops of tears, and with their bodies and bosoms emaciated under the pressure of their afflictions; were mourning with loud acclamations of woe in that dreary district, stricken by drought and dearth. 14. They cried, O ye sons and daughters, that lie dead with your emaciated bodies for want of food for these three days; say where fled your dear lives, stricken as they were by the steel of famine from the armour of your bodies. 15. We remember your sweet smiles, showing your coral teeth resembling the red gunjaphalas to our lords, as they descended from the towering tála (palm trees), with their red-ripe fruits held by their teeth, and growing on the cloud-capt mountains. 16. When shall we see again the fierce leap of our boys, springing on the wolves crouching amidst the groves of Kadamba and Jamb and Lavanga and Gunja trees.

17. We do not see those graces even in the face of Káma the god of love, that we were wont to observe in the blue and black countenances of our children, resembling the dark hue of Tamála leaves, when feasting on their dainty food of fish and flesh. Lamentation of the mother-in-law. 18. My nigrescent daughter, says one, has been snatched away from me with my dear husband like the dark Yamuná by the fierce Yama. O they have been carried away from me like the Tamála branch with its clustering flowers, by a tremendous gale from this sylvan scene. 19. O my daughter, with thy necklace of the strings of red gunja seeds, gracing the protuberant breast of thy youthful person; and with thy swarthy complexion, seeming as the sea of ink was gently shaken by the breeze. Ah! whither hast thou fled with thy raiment of woven withered leaves, and thy teeth as black as the jet-jambu fruits (when fully ripe). 20. O young prince! that wast as fair as the full moon, and that didst forsake the fairies of thy harem, and didst take so much delight in my daughter, where hast thou fled from us? Ah my daughter! she too is dead in thy absence, and fled from my presence.

21. Being cast on the waves of this earthly ocean, and joined to the daughter of a Chandála, thou wast, O prince! subjected to mean and vile employments, that disgraced thy princely character. (This is a taunt to all human beings that disgrace their heavenly nature, and grovel as beasts while living on earth). 22. Ah! that daughter of mine with her tremulous eyes, like those of the timorous fawn, and Oh! that husband valiant as the royal tiger; you are both gone together, as the high hopes and great efforts of men are fled with the loss of their wealth. 23. Now grown husbandless, and having of late lost my daughter also, and being thrown in a distant and barren land, I am become the most miserable and wretched of beings. Born of a low caste, I am cast out of all prospect in life, and have become a personification of terror to myself, and a sight of horror to others.

24. O! that the Lord has made me a widowed woman, and subjected me to the insult of the vulgar, and the hauteur of the affluent. Prostrated by hunger and mourning at the loss of a husband and child, I rove incessantly from door to door to beg alms for my supportance (as it is the case of most female beggars). 25. It is better that one who is unfortunate and friendless, or subject to passion and diseases, should rather die sooner than live in misery. The dead and inanimate beings are far better than the living miserable. 26. Those that are friendless, and have to toil and moil in unfriendly places, are like the grass of the earth, trampled under the feet, and overwhelmed under a flood of calamities. 27. The king seeing his aged mother-in-law mourning in this manner, offered her some consolation through the medium of her female companions, and then asked that lady to tell him, “who she was, what she did there, who was her daughter and who is his son.” 28. She answered him with tears in her eyes:—This village is called Pukkasa-Ghosha, here I had a Pukkasa for my husband, who had a daughter as gentle as the moon.

29. She happened to have here a husband as beautiful as the moon, who was a king and chanced to pass by this way. By this accident they were matched together, in the manner that an ass finds by chance a pot of honey lying on her way in the forest. 30. She lived long with him in connubial bliss, and produced to him both sons and daughters, who grew up in the covert of this forest, as the gourd plant grows on a tree serving as its support.

PROOF OF THE FUTILITY OF MIND. Argument. Lavana’s return to his Palace and the interpretation of his dream by Vasishtha. The Chandála continued:—O lord of men! After lapse of sometime, there occurred a dearth in this place owing to the drought of rain, which broke down all men under its diresome pressure. 2. Pressed by extreme scarcity, all our village people were scattered far abroad, and they perished in famine and never returned. 3. Thence forward O lord! we are exposed to utmost misery, and sit lamenting here in our helpless poverty. Behold us lord, all bathed in tears falling profusely from our undrying eyelids. 4. The King was lost in wonder, at hearing these words from the mouth of the elderly lady; and looking at the face of his follower the faithful minister, remained in dumb amazement as the figure in a picture. 5. He reflected repeatedly on this strange occurrence, and its curious concurrence with his adventures in the dream. He made repeated queries relating to other circumstances, and the more he heard and learned of them, the more he found their coincidence with the occurrences of his vision.

6. He sympathised with their woes, and saw them in the same state, as he had seen them before in his dream. And then he gave suitable gifts and presents to relieve their wants and woes. 7. He tarried there a long while, and pondered on the decrees of destiny; when the wheel of fortune brought him back to his house, wherein he entered amidst the loud cheers and low salutations of the citizens. 8. In the morning the King appeared in his court hall, and sitting there amidst his courtiers, asked me saying:—“How is it, O sage, that my dream has come to be verified in my presence to each item and to my great surprise”? 9. “They answered me exactly and to the very point all what I asked of them, and have removed my doubt of their truth from the mind, as the winds disperse the clouds of heaven.” 10. Know thus, O Ráma! it is the illusion of Avidya, that is the cause of a great many errors, by making the untruth appear as truth, and representing the sober reality as unreality. 11. Ráma said: Tell me sir, how the dream came to be verified; it is a mysterious account that cannot find a place in my heart.

12. Vasishtha replied:—All this is possible, O Ráma! to the illusion of ignorance (Avidya); which shows the fallacy of a picture (pata) in a pot (ghata); and represents the actual occurrences of life as dreams, and dreams as realities. 13. Distance appears to be nigh, as a distant mountain seen in the mirror; and a long time seems a short interval, as a night of undisturbed repose. 14. What is untrue seems to be a truth as in dreaming one’s own death in sleep; and that which is impossible appears possible, as in one’s aerial journey in a dream. 15. The stable seems unsteady, as in the erroneous notion of the motion of fixed objects to one passing in a vehicle; and the unmoving seem to be moving to one, as under the influence of his inebriation. 16. The mind infatuated by one’s hobby, sees exposed to its view, all what it thinks upon within itself. It sees things in the same light, as they are painted in his fancy, whether they be in existence or not, or real or unreal. 17. No sooner does the mind contract its ignorance, by its false notions of egoism and tuism, than it is subjected to endless errors, which have no beginning, middle or end and are of incessant occurrence in their course.

18. It is the notion that gives a shape to all things; it makes a kalpa age appear as a moment, and also prolongs a moment of time to a whole Kalpa. 19. A man deprived of understanding, believes himself as he is said, to have become a sheep; so a fighting ram thinks himself to be a lion in his ideal bravery. (The word sheep is a term of derision, as the lion is that of applause). 20. Ignorance causes the blunder of taking things for what they are not, and falling into the errors of egoism and tuism: so all errors in the mind produce errors in actions also. 21. It is by mere accident, that men come in possession of the objects of their desire; and it is custom that determines the mode of mutual dealings. (The gain is accidental and the dealing is conventional). 22. Lavana’s remembrance of the dream of his having lived in the habitation of the Pukkasa, was the internal cause, that represented to him the external picture of that abode, as it was a reality. (The mind shows what we think upon, whether they are real or unreal ones).

23. As the human mind is liable to forget many things which are actually done by some, so it is susceptible to remember those acts as true which were never done, but had been merely thought upon in the mind. (The forgetfulness of actualities as well as the thoughts of inactualities, belong both to the province of the mind. Here Lavana did not remember what he had not done, but recollected the thoughts that passed in his mind). 24. In this manner is the thought of my having eaten something while I am really fasting; and that of my having sojourned in a distant country in a dream, appears true to me while I think of them. 25. It was thence that the king came to find the same conduct in the habitation of the Chandálas at the side of Vindhyá, as he had been impressed with its notion in his dream as said before. 26. Again the false dream that Lavana had dreamt of the Vindhyan people, the same took possession of their minds also. (The same thought striking in the minds of different persons at the same time (as we see in men of the same mind)).

27. The notion of Lavana as settled in the minds of the Vindhyans, as the thoughts of these people rose in the mind of the king. (If it is possible for us to transfer our thoughts to one another, how much easier must it be for the superior instrumentality of dreams and revelations to do the same also. This is the yoga, whereby one man reads the mind of another). Again the same error taking possession of many minds all at once, proves the futility of common sense and universal belief being taken for certainty, hence the common belief of the reality of things, is the effect of universal delusion and error. 28. As the same sentiments and figures of speech, occur in different poets of distant ages and countries, so it is not striking that the same thoughts and ideas should rise simultaneously in the minds of different men also. (We have a striking instance of the coincidence of the same thought in the titles of Venisanhára and Rape of the Lock, in the minds of Vhattanarayn and Pope).

29. In common experience, we find the notions and ideas to stand for the things themselves, otherwise nothing is known to exist at all without our notion or idea of it in the mind. (All that we know of, are our ideas and nothing besides. Locke and Berkeley). 30. One idea embraces many others also under it, as those of the waves and current, are contained under that of water. And so one thought is associated by others relating its past, present and future conditions of being; as the thought of a seed accompanies the thoughts of its past and future states and its fruits and flowers of the tree. (So the word man, comprises almost every idea relating to humanity). 31. Nothing has its entity or non-entity, nor can anything be said to exist or not to be, unless we have a positive idea of the existent, and a negative notion of the in-existent. 32. All that we see in our error, is as inexistent as oiliness in sands; and so the bracelet is nothing in reality, but a formal appearance of the substance of gold.

33. A fallacy can have no connection with the reality, as the fallacy of the world with the reality of God, and so the fallacy of the ring with the substance of gold and of the serpent with the rope. The connection or mutual relation of things of the same kind, is quite evident in our minds. 34. The relation of gum resin and the tree, is one of dissimilar union, and affords no distinct ideas of them except that of the tree which contains the other. (So the idea of the false world, is lost in that of its main substratum of the Divine Spirit). 35. As all things are full of the Spirit, so we have distinct ideas of them in our minds, which are also spiritual substances; and are not as dull material stones which have no feelings. 36. Because all things in the world are intellectually true and real, we have therefore their ideas impressed in our minds also. 37. There can not be a relation or connection of two dissimilar things, which may be lasting, but are never united together. For without such mutual relation of things, no idea of both can be formed together.

38. Similar things being joined with similar form together their wholes of the same kind, presenting one form and differing in nothing. 39. The intellect being joined with an abstract idea, produces an invisible, inward and uniform thought: so dull matter joined to another dull object, forms a denser material object to view. But the intellectual and material can never unite together owing to their different natures. 40. The intellectual and material parts of a person, can never be drawn together in any picture; because the intellectual part having the intellect, has the power of knowledge, which is wanting in the material picture. 41. Intellectual beings do not take into account the difference of material things as wood and stone; which combine together for some useful purpose (as the building of a house and the like). 42. The relation between the tongue and taste is also homogeneous; because rasa taste and rasand the instrument of tasting, are both watery substances, and there is no heterogeneous relation between them. (And so of the other organs of sense and their respective objects).

43. But there is no relation between intellect and matter; as there is between the stone and the wood; the intellect cannot combine with wood and stone to form anything. (The mind and matter have no relation with one another, nor can they unite together in any way). 44. Spiritually considered, all things are alike, because they are full with the same spirit; otherwise the error of distinction between the viewer and the view, creates endless differences as betwixt wood and stones and other things. 45. The relation of combination though unseen in spirits, yet it is easily conceived that spirits can assume any form ad libitum and ad infinitum (but they must be spiritual and never material. So also a material thing can be converted to another material object, but never to a spiritual form). 46. Know ye seekers of truth, all things to be identic with the entity of God. Renounce your knowledge of nonentities and the various kinds of errors and fallacies and know the One as All to pan. (The omnipotent spirit of God, is joined with all material things, in its spiritual form only; and it is knowable to the mind and spirit of man, and never by their material organs of sense).

47. The Intellect being full with its knowledge, there is nothing wanting to us; it presents us everything in its circumference, as the imagination having its wide range, shews us the sights of its air-built castles and every thing beside. (The difference consists in the intellect’s shewing us the natures of things in their true light, and the imagination’s portraying them in false shapes and colours to our minds). 48. To Him there is no limit of time or place, but his presence extends over all his creation. It is ignorance that separates the creator from creation, and raises the errors of egoism and tuism (i.e. of the subjective and objective. The union of these into One is the ground-work of pantheism). 49. Leaving the knowledge of the substantive gold, man contracts the error of taking it for the formal ornament. The mistake of the jewel for gold, is as taking one thing for another, and the production for the producer. 50. The error of the phenomenon vanishes upon loss of the eyesight, and the difference of the jewel (or visible shape), is lost in the substance of gold.

51. The knowledge of unity removes that of a distinct creation, as the knowledge of the clay takes off the sense of puppet soldiers made of it. (So the detection of Æsop’s ass in the lion’s skin, and that of the daw with the peacock’s feathers, removed the false appearance of their exteriors). 52. The same Brahma causes the error of the reality of the exterior worlds, as the underlying sea causes the error of the waves on its surface. The same wood is mistaken for the carved figure, and the common clay is taken for the pot which is made of it. (The truth is that, which underlies the appearance). 53. Between the sight and its object, there lieth the eye of the beholder, which is beyond the sight of its viewer, and is neither the view nor the viewer. (Such is the supreme Being hidden alike from the view and the viewer). 54. The mind traversing from one place to another, leaves the body in the interim, which is neither moving nor quite unmoved; since its mental part only is in its moving state. (So should you remain sedate with your body, but be ever active in your mind).

55. Remain always in that quiet state, which is neither one of waking, dreaming nor of sleeping; and which is neither the state of sensibility or insensibility; but one of everlasting tranquility and rest. 56. Drive your dullness, and remain always in the company of your sound intellect as a solid rock; and whether in joy or grief, commit your soul to your Maker. 57. There is nothing which one has to lose or earn in this world; therefore remain in uniform joy and bliss, whether you think yourself to be blest or unblest in life. (“Naked came I, and naked must I return; blessed be the name of the Lord”). 58. The soul residing in thy body, neither loves nor hates aught at any time; therefore rest in quiet, and fear naught for what betides thy body, and engage not thy mind to the actions of thy body. 59. Remain free from anxiety about the present, as you are unconcerned about the future. Never be impelled by the impulses of your mind; but remain steadfast in your trust in the true God.

60. Be unconcerned with all, and remain as an absent man. Let thy heart remain callous to everything like a block of stone or toy of wood; and look upon your mind as an inanimate thing, by the spiritual light of your soul. 61. As there is no water in the stone nor fire in water, so the spiritual man has no mental action, nor the Divine spirit hath any. (There is no mutability of mental actions in the immutable mind of God). 62. If that which is unseen, should ever come to do anything or any action; that action is not attributed to the unseen agent, but to something else in the mind. (But the mind being ignored, its actions are ignored also). 63. The unselfpossessed (unspiritual) man, that follows the dictates of his fickle and wilful mind, resembles a man of the border land, following the customs of the out-cast Mlechchás or barbarians. 64. Having disregarded the dictates of your vile mind, you may remain at ease and as fearless, as an insensible statue made of clay. 65. He who understands that there is no such thing as the mind, or that he had one before but it is dead in him to-day; becomes as immovable as a marble statue with this assurance in himself.

66. There being no appearance of the mind in any wise, and you having no such thing in you in reality except your soul; say, why do you in vain infer its existence for your own error and harm? 67. Those who vainly subject themselves to the false apparition of the mind, are mostly men of unsound understandings, and bring fulminations on themselves from the full-moon of the pure soul. 68. Remain firm as thou art with thyself (soul), by casting afar thy fancied and fanciful mind from thee; and be freed from the thoughts of the world, by being settled in the thought of the Supreme Soul. 69. They who follow a nullity as the unreal mind, are like those fools who shoot at the inane air, and are cast into the shade. 70. He that has purged off his mind, is indeed a man of great understanding; he has gone across the error of the existence of the world, and become purified in his soul. We have considered long, and never found anything as the impure mind in the pure soul.

ASCERTAINMENT OF THE SELF OR SOUL. Argument. Description of the grounds of knowledge, vanity of fears and sorrows, and the natures of the intellect and soul. Vasishtha said (Prose). After the birth of a man and a slight development of his understanding, he should associate the company of good and wise men. 2. There is no other way except by the light of Sástras and association with the good and wise, to ford over the river of ignorance, which runs in its incessant course flowing in a thousand streams. 3. It is by means of reasoning that man is enabled to discern what is good for him, and what he must avoid to do. 4. He then arrives to that ground of reason which is known as good will, or a desire to do what is good and keep from what is bad and evil. 5. Then he is led by his reason to the power of reasoning, and discerning the truth from untruth, and the right from wrong. 6. As he improves in knowledge, he gets rid of his improper desires, and purifies his mind from all worldly cares. 7. Then he is said to have gained that stage of knowledge, which is called the purity of his soul and mind and of his heart and conduct.

8. When the yogi or adept attains to his full knowledge, he is said to have arrived at his state of goodness—satva. 9. By this means and the curtailing of his desires, he arrives to the state called unattachment or indifference to all worldly matters (anásakta), and is no more subjected to the consequence of his actions. 10. From the curtailment of desires, the yogi learns to abstract his mind from the unrealities of the world. 11. And whether sitting inactive in his posture of Samádhi meditation, or doing anything for himself or others, he must fix his mind to whatever is productive of real good to the world. His soul being cool by the tenuity of his desires, is habituated to do its duties, without the knowledge of what it is doing. (He neither fondly pursues anything nor thinks with ardour of any. His want of desire makes him indifferent to all, and like a man waking from his sleep, he takes himself to the discharge of his duties). 12. Verily, he who has subdued his mind, has reached to the contemplative stage of yoga meditation.

13. Thus one having his mind dead in himself, learns by practice of years, to perform his duties, by refraining from his thoughts of external objects. Such a one is said to have attained the turya or fourth stage of his spiritual elevation, and to have become liberated in his life-time. 14. He is not glad to get anything, nor sorry to miss it. He lives without fear of accidents, and is content with whatever he gets. 15. Thou hast O Ráma! known whatever is to be known by man; and thou hast certainly extirpated thy desire in all thy actions through life. 16. Thy thoughts are all spiritual, and transcend the actions of the corporeal body, though thou art in thy embodied state. Do not give up thy self to joy or grief, but know thyself to be free from decay and defect. 17. Spiritually thou art a pure and bright substance, which is ubiquious and ever in its ascendancy. It is devoid of pleasure and pain, and of death and disease. 18. Why dost thou lament at the grief or loss of a friend, when thou art so friendless in thyself. Being thrown alone in this world, whom dost thou claim as a friend of thy soul?

19. We see only the particles of matter of which this body is composed; it exists and passes away in its time from its place; but there is no rising or falling of the soul. 20. Being imperishable in thyself, why dost thou fear to fall into naught? And why think of the destruction of thy soul, which is never subject to death? 21. When a jar is broken in twain from its upper part, its vacuity is not lost, but mixes with the air; so the body being destroyed, the indestructible soul is not lost with it (but unites with its original source). 22. As the sunlight causing the appearance of a river in the mirage, is not lost at the disappearance of the phenomenal river; so the immortal soul does not perish upon dissolution of the frail body. 23. There is a certain illusion, which raises the false appetites within us; otherwise the unity of the soul requires the help of no duality or secondary substance, in order to be united with the sole unity. 24. There is no sensible object, whether visible, tangible, audible or of taste or smelling (which relate to the particular senses and brain), that can affect the unconnected soul.

25. All things and their powers, are contained in the all-powerful and all-comprehensive soul; these powers are displayed throughout the world, but the soul is as void as the empty air. 26. It is the mental deception, O Rághava, that presents before it the phenomena of the triple world, representing diverse forms according to the triplicate nature of man (the satva, rajas and tamas). 27. There are threefold methods of dispelling this delusion of the mind, namely: by the tranquility of the mind, by destroying its desires, and by abandonment of acts (which lead only to errors in our repeated regenerations). 28. The world is a crushing mill, with its lower and upper stones of the earth and heaven; our desires are the cords that incessantly drag us under it: therefore Ráma, break off these ropes (and you will escape the danger of being crushed by it). 29. Our unacquaintance with spiritual knowledge, is the cause of all our errors; but our acquaintance of it, leads us to endless joy and ultimately to Brahma himself. 30. The living being having proceeded from Brahma, and travelled over the earth at pleasure, turns at last to Brahma by means of his knowledge of Him.

31. Ráma! all things have sprung from one Being, who is perfect felicity itself, inconceivable and undecaying in its nature; and all these are as the rays of that light, or as the light of that everlasting fire. 32. These are as lines on the leaves of trees, and as the curls and waves on the surface of waters. They are as ornaments made of that gold, and as the heat and cold of that fire and water. 33. Thus the triple world subsists in the thought of the Divine mind. It has thus sprung from the mind of God, and rests in its self-same state with the all-comprehending mind. 34. This Mind is called Brahma, who is the soul of all existence. He being known the world is known also (i.e., the world is known through him); and as he is the knower of all, he gives us the knowledge of all things. (Thus the Sruti:—There is no knowing of anything but by the knowledge that He imparts to us). 35. This all-pervasive Being is explained to us by the learned, by the coined epithets of the soul, intellect and Brahma, used both in the sástras as in the popular language.

36. The pure notion that we have of an everlasting Being, apart from all sensible ideas and impressions, is called the Intellect and soul. 37. This Intellect or Intelligent soul, is much more transparent than the etherial sky; and it is the plenum, that contains the plenitude of the world, as a disjoined and distinct reflexion of itself. 38. The knowledge of the separate existence of the unreal reflexion of the world, apart from that real reflector, is the cause of all our ignorance and error; but the view of their subsistence in the mirror of the supreme soul, blends them all to myself also (who are the same soul). 39. Now Ráma, that hast a bodiless soul of the form of pure intellect, thou canst have no cause to fall into the error, of being sorry for or afraid of the vanities of the world. 40. How can the unembodied soul be affected by the passions and feelings of the body? It is the ignorant and unintelligent only, that are subject to vain suspicions about unrealities. 41. The indestructible intellect of the unintelligent even, is not destroyed by the destruction of their bodies, how then should the intelligent be afraid of their dissolution?

42. The intellect is irresistible in its course, and roves about the solar path (ecliptic); it is the intellectual part that makes the man, and not the outward body. (Puri sete purushah; it is the inner soul that is called man). 43. The soul called the purusha or inner person, whether it abideth in the body or not, and whether it is intelligent or otherwise (rational or irrational), never dies upon the death of the body. 44. Whatever miseries you meet with, Ráma! in this transient world, all appertain to the body, and not to the intangible soul or intellect. 45. The intellectual soul being removed from the region of the mind (which is but an inward sense, and of the nature of vacuity, and not the grains of the brain composing the mind), is not to be approached by the pleasures and pains affecting the body and mind. 46. The soul that has curbed its earthly desires, flies to its seat in the spirit of Brahma, after the dissolution of its prison house of the body; in the same manner as the bee lying hid under the coverlet of the lotus petals in the darkness of the night, takes to its heavenward flight by the dawning light of the day.

47. If life is known to be frail, and the living state to be a transient scene, then say, O Ráma! what it is that is lost by loss of this prison-house of the body, and what is it that you mourn for? 48. Think therefore, O Ráma! on the nature of truth; and mind not about the errors of ignorance. Be freed from your earthly desires, and know the sinless soul to be void of all desires. 49. The intellectual soul being tranquil and transparent, and a mere witness of our doings, without any doing or desire of its own, receives the reflexion of the undesirous God, as a mirror reflects the images of things. 50. The soul being, as said before, a translucent particle, reflects the images of all worlds in itself; as a polished gem reflects the rays of light in its bosom. 51. The relation of the indifferent soul with the world, is like that of the mirror and its reflexions; the difference and identity of the soul and the world, are of the same kind. 52. As the activities of living beings, have a free play with the rising sun; so the duties of the world, are fully discharged by the rising of the intellect.

53. No sooner you get rid of your error of the substantiality of the world, than you shall come to the consciousness of its being a vacuum, resting in the spirit of God (which is the receptacle of infinite space, and whatever there appears in it). 54. As it is the nature of a lighted lamp to spread its lustre all around, so it is the nature of mental philosophy, to enlighten us with the real state of the soul. 55. The essence of the supreme soul gave rise to the mind (will) at first, which spread out the universe with its net work of endless varieties. It was as the sky issuing out of the infinite vacuity, and assuming the shape of the blue atmosphere which is also a nullity. 56. Privation of desires melts down the mind, and dissolves the mist of ignorance from the face of the intellect. Then appears the bright light of the one infinite and increate God, like the clear firmament of autumn after the dispersion of clouds.

57. The mind sprouts out at first from the supreme soul with all its activities, and takes upon it the nature of the lotus-born Brahmá by its desire of creation. It stretches out a variety of worlds by its creative will, which are also as the fancied apparitions, appearing before the imaginations of deluded boys. 58. Non-entity appears as an entity before us, it dies away at death, and reappears with our new birth. The mind itself takes its rise from the divine intellect, and displays itself in the substance of the Divine Soul, as the waves play about on the surface of the waters of the deep. FOOTNOTES: The reader is referred to the following passage in the story of Rip Van Winkle in Irving’s Sketch-Book. “To him the whole twenty years, had been but as one night”. The strange events that had taken place during his torpor were, that there had been a revolutionary war, when his country had thrown off the yoke of old England, and that instead of being a subject of George the third, he was now a free citizen of the United States, pp. 32-33.

The intuition of his existence, is the best proof of the same. Sruti. So says the mystic sufi:—I sought him everywhere but found him nowhere; I then looked within myself, and saw him there—as his seat was there. Activity is attended with the pleasure of enjoyment, with the pain of bondage; and inactivity with the pleasure of freedom, and the pain of poverty. The insensible are fond of fruition at the expense of their freedom; but the wise prefer their liberty with poverty, as it is said in the Upanishad:— श्रयोहि पुंसामाधकं बृणोते । प्रयोमन्दीयोग क्षेमादधिकं बृणोते । The black Rákshasas were believed to have been a colony of African Negroes in southern India and Ceylon. The Rakhs is Rax, as Sycorax of Shakespeare.

Note:—The whole story of the fiendish Súchí is an allegory of the human mind, and its rapacity. The transformation of the huge to the thin pinnate body, and again its assumption of the big form, are allegorical of the change of the corporeal and spiritual bodies—the Sthúla and Súkshma saríras, in the course of the repeated transmigrations of the soul from its gross to subtle forms by the desire of the mind. Tired of the world the mind forsakes the gross body upon death, and assumes the finer spiritual form, but being soon dissatisfied with it reverts to its former gross form again. It is also explained to be the two states of animá and garimá, the minuteness and bulkiness, which the Yogi attains by his yoga. It is a curious fact in the theological works of Vedánta, that princes and ladies, employed themselves much more to the cultivation of their minds, and to the investigation of mental and spiritual Philosophy, than other persons and tribes. So we see Surúchi, Lílá, Visúchí and Sarasvatí were all female interlocutors in this work and some Upanishads also, though female education was subsequently abrogated by law.

Samvitti is the superior or subjective consciousness personified as Viráj, and samvid or inferior consciousness of the objective as received in the personification of Viswa. Here Schelling says:—The absolute infinite cannot be known in personal or objective consciousness; but requires a superior faculty called the intuition. The joint knowledge of the subjective and objective is had by Ecstasy, which discerns the identity of the subject and object in a series of souls which are as the innumerable individual eyes, which the infinite World-spirit behold, in it-self, Lewis Hist. Phil. II. 580.

So says a spiritualistic philosopher. Think you this earth of ours is a lifeless and unsentient bulk, while the worm on her surface is in the enjoyment of life? No, the universe is not dead. This life—jíva, what is it but the pervading afflux of deific love and life, vivifying all nature, and sustaining the animal and vegetable world as well as the world of mind? These suns, systems, planets and satellites, are not mere mechanisms. The pulsations of a divine life throb in them all, and make them rich in the sense that they too are parts of the divine cosmos. Should it be objected that it proves too much; that it involves the identity of the vital principle of animals and vegetables, let us not shrink from the conclusion. The essential unity of all spirit and all life with this exuberant life from God, is a truth from which we need not recoil, even though it bring all animal and vegetable forms within the sweep of immortality. Epes Sargent.

The unity of all phenomena was the dream of ancient philosophy. To reduce all this multiplicity to a single principle, has been and continues to be the ever recurring problem. To the question of a unity of substance the Greek science, repeatedly applied itself; and so did the sophists of Persia and India. It was the craving for unity, which led the white men of Asia, the ancient Aryan race, to the conception of God as the one substance immanent in the universe. At first they were polytheists, but with the progress of thought their number of gods diminished, and became the authors of Veda. At last arrived to the conception of a unity of forces, of a divine power as the ultimate substratum of things. They regarded the beings of the world, as in effect, composed of two elements; the one real and of a nature permanent and absolute, and the other relative, flowing and variable and phenomenal; the one spirit and the other matter, and both proceeding from an inseparable unity, a single substance. Ibid. According to Vásishtha this single substance is the chit or divine intelligence, which produces the Mind, which is conversant with matter.

Note. The powers of the Intellect are, perception, memory, imagination and judgment. Ego is the subject of thoughts, or the subjective and really existent being. The personal God Brahmá is an emanation of God according to the Gnostics, and is like the Demiurgus of Plato next to God and soul of the world. Plotinus. The allegory of the three spheres, means no more than the triple state of man, as a spiritual, an intellectual and a physical or corporeal being. The intellectual state in the text, is properly the spiritual and highest state of a human being. The mental is next to the intellectual or midmost state of man, and the physical or corporeal state, is the lowest condition, in which the elevated nature of humanity is subjected like an inferior animal, to grovel upon the earth. Compare the adventure of the prince Tájul Malur in Guli Bakáwalí, and his bearing the burthen of his children by the Negro wife on his shoulders.

The Text uses the terms jnána and ajnána, which literally signify knowledge and ignorance, and mean to say that, we know the subjective ourselves only (as-ego-sum) and are ignorant of the true nature of the objective, as whether they are or not and what they are. Though it would be more appropriate to use the words nischaya and anischaya or certainty and uncertainty, because we are certain of our own existence, and are quite uncertain of every thing besides, which we perceive in our triple states of waking, dreaming and sound sleep, which incessantly produce and present before us a vast variety of objects, all of which lead us to error by their false appearances. All things existent in the Divine mind in their eternally ideal state, present the same ideas to our minds also, which are of the similar nature and substance with the Divine.