The same. Manu's Admonition to Ikshaku.
Argument.—On the Elevation of Humanity and its ultimate liberation.
MANU continued:—Now the living liberated yogi, in whatever manner he is clad, and however well or ill fed he may be, and wherever he may sleep or lay down his humble head, he rests with the joy of his mind, and in a state of perfect ease and blissfulness, as if he were the greatest emperor of the world. (Hence the fakirs are called shah sahibs by people).
2. He breaks down all the bonds of his caste and creed, and the rites and restraints of his order by the battery of the sástra; and roves freed from the snare of society, as a lion breaking loose from his cage, and roaming rampant every where. (Here the sástra means the upanishads on the esoteric faith of spiritual freedom).
3. He has his mind abstracted from all sensible objects, and fixed on an object which no words can express (i.e. the unspeakable rapture of his mind); and he shines forth with a grace in his face, resembling the clearness of an autumnal sky.
4. He is always as deep and clear (i.e. grave in his mind and clear headed), as a large lake in a valley; and being rapt in holy and heavenly joy, he is always cheerful in himself, without his care for or want of anything else.
5. He is ever content in his mind without having anything for his dependance, or any expectation of the reward of his actions; and is neither addicted to any meritorious or unworthy acts, nor subject to joy or grief for aught of pleasure or pain.
6. As a piece of crystal does not receive or emit any other colour in its reflexion, excepting that of its pure whiteness; so the spiritualist is not imbued with the tinge of the effects of his actions. (i.e. The spiritualist does not benefit by the retribution of his acts).
7. He remains indifferent in human society, and is not affected either by the torture or subministration of his body; he deems his pain and pleasure as passing on his shadow, and never takes them to his heart, as they do not touch his intangible soul. (It was by virtue of this indifference, that the holy saints did not shrink under their persecutions and martyrdom).
8. Whether honoured or slighted by men, he neither praises nor is displeased with them; and remains himself either connected or unconnected with the customs and rules of society.
9. He hurts no body, nor is hurt by any; and may be free from the feelings of anger or affection, fear and joy (and other passions which are allotted to humanity).
10. No one can have the greatness of mind of his own nature, but it is possible for the author of nature, to raise the greatness of mind even in a boy.
11. Whether a man quits his body (dies) in a holy place, or in the house of a low chandála; or whether one dies at this moment (in youth), or many years afterwards (in old age).
12. He is released from his bondage to life, no sooner he comes to his knowledge of the soul and gets rid of his desires; because the error of his egoism is the cause of his bondage, and the wasting of it by his knowledge, is the means of his liberation.
13. He the living liberated man is to be honoured and praised, and to be bowed down to with veneration, and regarded with every attention, by every one who is desirous of his prosperity and elevation. (Because we honour ourselves by honouring the great).
14. No religious sacrifice nor wilful austerity, no charity nor pilgrimage, can lead us to that supremely holy state of human dignity; which is attainable by us only by our respectful attendance upon the godly, who have got rid of the troubles of the world. (Hence attendance on saints and at their holy shrines, is accounted as productive of our sanctity).
15. Vasishtha said:—The venerable sage Manu, having spoken in this manner, departed to the celestial abode of his sire Brahmá; and Ikshaku continued to act according to the precepts, which were delivered to him by the sacred seer.
On the Difference between the Knowing and Unknowing.
Argument.—Theoretical and Practical Yogas and the practices of Aerial journey &c.
RÁMA said:—Tell me sir, that art most learned in spiritual knowledge, whether the living liberated man of this kind (as you have described) attains to any extraordinary power; (or remains neutral with his theoretical knowledge of yoga only).
2. Vasishtha replied:—The all-knowing sage, has sometimes a greater knowledge of one thing than another, and has his mind directed in one particular way than any other; but the learned seer of a contented mind, has his soul quite at rest in itself.
3. There are many that have by their consummate knowledge of particular mantras, tantras, and the virtues of certain minerals, attained the power of aerial flight &c.; but what is there that is extraordinary in these (when these powers are in constant practice in the flight of ordinary birds and flies?).
4. So the powers of self-expansion and contraction &c., have been acquired by others by their constant practice of the same, (anima, laghima and the like), which are disregarded by other seers in spiritual knowledge.
5. There is this difference of these knowing seers, from the bulk of idle practitioners in yoga, that they are content with their dispassionate mind, without placing any reliance in practice.
6. This is verily the sign of the unconspicuous seer in yoga, that he is always cool and calm in his mind, and freed from all the errors of the world; and in whom the traces of the passions of love and anger, sorrow and illusion and the mischances of life are scarcely visible.
The Story of the Stag and the Huntsman.
Argument.—Degradation of the divine soul of man to the state of the animal soul.
VASISHTHA said:—Know now that the Lord (Divine soul), stops to take upon itself of the nature of the living or animal soul, as a Brahman (by birth) assumes the character of a vile sudra for some mean purpose, by disregarding the purity of its original nature. (This is the degradation of the lordly and blissful soul, to the state of the sensitive animal soul, by reason of its meaner propensity).
2. There are two kinds of living beings, that come into existence in the beginning of the repeated creations; the one coming into existence without any causality, and are thence called to be causeless or uncaused (such as that is they are not made like pots and the like (ghatádi), by means of the instrumental causality of the potters wheel, stick &c.)
3. Thus the soul emanating from the Divine, is subjected to various transmigrations, and becomes many kinds of beings (in succession), according to its previous acts and propensities. (Thus it is the tendency of the soul towards good or evil, that is the cause of its rise and fall or elevation or degradation).
4. All beings emanate originally without any cause, from the source of the divine essence; and then their actions become the secondary cause of continuous transmigrations (until the end of the world). (All souls are bound to their revolutions in repeated births, until their final extinction in the deity on the last day of resurrection, or by their prior liberation by mukti or nirvána).
5. The personal acts of men, are the causes both of their happiness as well as misery; and again the will which is produced by the conscious knowledge of one's self, becomes the cause of the action (i.e. the will proceeding from one's consciousness of himself, is the cause of his action, which again becomes the cause of his pleasure or pain as its result).
6. Now this will or desire of any action or fruition, being likewise the cause of one's bondage to this world, it is to be got rid of for his liberation from it; and this what they call moksha, is no more than our release from the bond of our desire. (Every wish enchains the soul to earth, and drags it along to repeated birth).
7. Be therefore careful to make your choice of what is right and proper, from whatever is wrong and improper; and try betimes to contract your wishes within the narrowest scale.
8. Do not let yourself to be possessor or possest of any thing or person, but give up thinking on anything, beside what remains after the thoughts of all other things. (i.e. Think alone of thine and the supreme soul, which remains in the absence of everything else).
9. Anything to which the senses are addicted at all times, serves to bind the soul the more that it has its zest for the same; as also to unbind and release the mind in proportion to the distaste which it bears to it. (i.e. Love a thing to be enslaved to it, and hate the same to be saved from it).
10. If there is anything which is pleasing to thy soul, know the same as thy binding string to the earth; if on the contrary thou findest nothing to thy liking here, you are then freed from the trammels of all the trifles on earth.
11. Therefore let nothing whatever tempt or beguile thy mind, to anything existent in either the animate or inanimate kind; and regard everything from a mean straw to a great idol as unworthy of thy regard.
12. Think not thyself to be either the doer or giver, or eater or offerer, of whatsoever thou doest or givest, or eatest or offerest in thy holy oblations of the Gods; but art quite aloof from all thy bodily actions, owing to the immaterial nature of thy self or soul.
13. Concern not thyself with thy past acts, or thy cares for future, over which thou hast no command; but discharge well thy present duties, as they are and come to thy hand.
14. All the feelings and passions of men, as their appetites, desires and the rest, are strung together with their hearts; and therefore it is requisite to sever these heart strings with the weapon of a brave and strong heart (because the feelings are fostered in weak hearts and minds only).
15. Now break your sensuous mind by the power of your reasoning mind, and restrain its rage of running into errors; as they break the iron pegs by force of iron hammers (and remove one thing by another of the same kind—similia similibus curantur.)
16. So intelligent men rub out one dirt by another, and remove one poison by another poisonous substance; and so do soldiers oppose one steel by a weapon of the same metal.
17. All living beings have a triple form, composed of the subtile, solid and the imperceptible spiritual bodies; now lay hold and rely on the last, in utter disregard of the two former.
18. The solid or gross body, is composed of the hands, feet and other members and limbs; and subsist in this nether world upon its subsistence of food only.
19. The living being has an intrinsic body also, which is derived from within; and is composed of all its wishes in the world, and is known as the mental or intellectual part of the body.
20. Know the third form to be the transcendental or spiritual body, which assumes all forms, and is the simple intellectual soul; which is without its beginning or end, and without any alteration in its nature.
21. This is the pure turya state, wherein you must remain steadfast as in that of your living liberation; and reject the two others, in which you must place no reliance.
22. Ráma said:—I have understood the three definite states, of waking, dreaming, and sound sleep, as they have been defined to me; but the fourth state of turya is yet left undefined, and I beg you to explain it clearly unto me.
23. Vasishtha answered:—It is that state of the mind, in which the feelings of one's egoism and non-egoism, and those of his existence and inexistence are utterly drowned under a total impassibility; and the mind is settled in one invariable and uniform tenor of tranquillity and transparency.
24. It is that state in which the selfish feelings of mine and thine, are altogether wanting; and in which one remains as a mere witness and spectator of the affairs of life. This is the turya state of living liberation. (It is the state of a philosopher who lives to see and philosophise and mix with nothing).
25. This is neither the state of waking, owing to its want of any wish or concern, nor it is the state of sound sleep, which is one of perfect insensibility.
26. It is that calmness in which the wise man sees every thing, to be going on in the world; and it is like the state of insensibility of the ignorant, in which they perceive no stir in the course of the world. (The calmness of the wise like the dullness of others is their turya also).
27. The evenness of the mind after subsidence of every jot of its egotism in it, like the setting of the turbid waters underneath, is the turya state of the insouciance of the soul.
28. Hear me relate to you an instance on this subject, which will confer as clear a light to your enlightened mind, as that of all seeing Gods.
29. It happened once that a huntsman, roaming for his prey in some part of a forest, chanced to see a sage sitting silent in his solitude; and thinking it as something strange, he accosted him saying:—
30. Have you seen, O sage, a wounded stag flying before me this way, with an arrow fixed in its back?
31. The sage replied:—You ask me, where your stag has fled; but my friend, know that sages like ourselves and living in the forest, are as cool as blocks of stone (and insensible of every occurrence on earth).
32. We want that egoism which enables one, in conducting the transactions of the world; and know my friend, that it is the mind, which conducts all the actions of the senses. (All actions of the organs of senses being under the direction of the mind, as well as all sensible perceptions under its attention).
33. Know that the feeling of my egoism, has been long before dissolved in my mind; and I have no perception whatever of the three states of waking, dreaming and sound sleep. But I rest quiet in my fourth state of impossibility, wherein there is no vision of the visibles.
34. The huntsman heard these words of the sage, but being quite at a loss to comprehend its meaning, he departed to his own way without uttering a word.
35. I tell you therefore, O Ráma, there is no other state beyond the fourth or turya quietism; it is that unalterable impassivity of the mind, which is not to be found in any other.
36. The waking, dreaming and sound sleep, are the three palpable conditions of the mind; and these are respectively the dark, quiet and insensible states, in which the mind is situated in this world.
37. The waking state presents us the dark complexion of the mind, for its susceptibility of all the passions and evils of life; and the sleeping state shows us its quiet aspect, for want of its cares and anxieties.
38. The state of sound sleep is one of insensibility, and the state beyond these three bears the feature of death in it. Yet this dead like figure possesses the principle of life in it, which is diligently preserved by yogis from harm and decay.
39. Now Ráma, the soul which remains in its quiet rest, after its renunciation of all desire, is said by sages to be in the coma or cool calmness of itself, and the liberated state of the holy and devout yogi on earth.
The means of Attaining the Steadiness of the Turya State.
Argument.—The means of attaining stability on Insouciance.
VASISHTHA resumed:—Know Ráma, that the conclusion which is arrived at in all works on spiritual philosophy, is the negation of every thing except the entity of the supreme soul; and that there is no principle of ignorance (avidyá) nor that of delusion (máyá), as a secondary agent under one quiescent Brahma, who is ever without a second.
2. The spirit of the Lord is always calm, with the serene brightness of the divine Intellect in itself; it is full of its omnipotence, and is attributed with the appellation of Brahma.
3. The Divine Spirit is ascertained by some as the formless vacuum itself, and by others as omniscience, and is called as the Lord God by most people in the world.
4. Do you avoid all these, O sinless Ráma, and remain quite silent in yourself, and be extinct in the divine essence, by restraining the actions of your heart and mind and by the tranquillity of your soul.
5. Have a quiet soul in yourself, and remain as a deaf and dumb man in your outward appearance; look always within yourself, and be full with the Divine Spirit.
6. Discharge the duties of your waking state, as if you are doing them in your sound sleep; forsake every thing in your inward mind, and do whatever comes to thee outwardly, without taking any into thy heart.
7. The essence of the mind is only for one's misery, as its want is for his highest felicity; therefore the mind must be drowned in the intelligent soul, by destroying the action of the mental powers altogether.
8. Remain as cold as a stone, at the sight of anything, which is either delightsome or disgusting to thee; and by this means learn to subdue everything in the world under thy control.
9. The objective is neither for our pleasure or pain, nor is it the intermediate state of the two; therefore it is by diligent attention to the subjective, that we can attain the end of all our misery. (Live to thyself alone and unmindful of all others, in order to be completely blest).
10. He who has known the supreme soul, has found within himself a delight; resembling the cooling beams of the full bright moon; and being possest of the full knowledge of the essence of all things in the three worlds, performs his parts in a manner as he did not attend to them.
Description of the Spiritual state.
Argument:—The seven stages of yoga Meditation, and the true state of spirituality.
RÁMA said:—Tell me sir, the practices of the seven stages of yoga; and the characteristics of yogis in every stage.
2. Vasishtha related:—Know Ráma, mankind to be divided into two classes of the zealous and resigned (i.e. the active and the inactive); the one expectant of heavenly reward, and the other inclined to supreme felicity. Know now their different characters as follows:—
3. Those that are addicted to enjoyments, think the quietude of nirvána as nothing to their purpose, and give preference to worldliness above the final bliss of others; and he that acts his part on this sense, is styled an active and energetic man.
4. Such a man of the world bears his resemblance to a tortoise, which though it has its neck well hid in its shell, still stretches it out to drink the salt water of the sea it inhabits; until after many births, he gets a better life for his salvation (as when the tortoise is removed to a lake of fresh water).
5. But he who reflects on the nothingness of the world, and the uselessness of his situation in it; such a man does not allow himself to be carried on, by the current of his old and rotatory course of duties here in day after day.
6. And he who reflects in himself, after being released from the burden of his business, on the delight of his rest after labour, he is the man who is said to repose in his quiescence.
7. When a man comes to reconnoitre in himself, how he shall become dispassionate, and get over the boisterous ocean of the world; such a man is said to have come to his good and right sense, and to stand on the way to his tolerance.
8. He who has an unfeelingness in his heart, of the very many thoughts that daily rise in his mind; and manages his gravest and greatest concerns, without being much concerned about them in his mind; each a man is said to taste the delight of his stayedness day by day.
9. He who condemns the rustic amusements and mean employments of men; and instead of taking up the faults and failings of others for his merry talk, employs himself to meritorious acts.
10. Whose mind, is engaged in agreeable tasks and unpainsome acts; who is afraid of sin, and disdains all pleasures and bodily enjoyments.
11. Whose discourses are full of love and tenderness, and appropriate without any harshness; and whose speeches are suitable to the time and place in which they are delivered.
12. Such a man is said to stand on the first step of yoga, when he makes it his duty to attend the society of the good and great, whom he learns to imitate in his thoughts, words, and actions.
13. He collects also the work on divine learning from every where, and reads with attention and diligence; he then considers their contexts, and lays hold on the tenets, which serve to save him from this sinful world.
14. Such a man is said to have come upon the (first) stage of yoga, or else he is a hypocrite who assumes the guise of a yogi for his own interest only. The yogi then comes to the next step of yoga, which is styled the stage of investigation—Vichára.
15. He then hears from the mouths of the best pandits, the explanations of the srutis and smritis, the rules of good conduct, and the manner of meditation and conduct of yoga practice.
16. He then learns the divisions of categories and distinction of things, together with the difference between actions that are to be done or avoided; all which being heard from the mouth of an adept in yoga, will facilitate his course through the other stages, in like manner as the master of a house enters with facility into every apartment of his dwelling. (The guidance of a guru or spiritual guide, is essential to the practice of yoga).
17. He wears off his outer habit of pride and vanity, his jealousy and avarice, and the other passions which formed as it were an outer garment of his person, as a snake casts off his slough from him.
18. Having thus purified his mind (from the vile passions), he attends to the service of his spiritual preceptors and holy persons, and makes himself acquainted with the mysteries of religion. (This is the second stage of yoga, which is one of moral discipline and search after truth).
19. He then enters into the third stage of unsociality or avoidance of all company, which he finds to be as agreeable to him as a bed of flowers. (Lit.: a bedstead be strewn with flowers).
20. Here he learns to fix his mind to its steadiness, according to the dictates of the sástras; and passes his time in talking on spiritual subjects, in society of hermits and devotees.
21. He sits also with the dispassionate Vairágis, and religious recluses sanyásis who are disgusted with the world; and relying on the firm rock of his faith, he wears out his long life with ease.
22. He passes his moral life with cheerful delight of his loneliness, and pleasing tranquillity of his mind in his woodland retreat and wanderings.
23. By study of holy books and performance of religious acts, he gets a clear view of things, as it generally attends upon the virtuous lives of men.
24. The sensible man who has arrived to the third stage of his yoga practice, perceives in himself two kinds of his unconnectedness with the world, as you will now hear from me.
25. Now this disconnection of one with all others is of two sorts, one of which is his ordinary disassociation with all persons and things, and the other is his absolute unconnection with every thing including himself. (i.e. One's entire irrelation with both the subjective and objective).
26. The ordinary unconnection is the sense of one's being neither the subject or object of his action, nor of his being the slayer of or slain by anybody; but that all accidents are incidental to his prior acts (of past lives), and all dependant to the dispensations of Providence.
27. It is the conviction that, I have no control over my happiness or misery or pain or pleasure; and that all prosperity and adversity, employment and privation, and health and disease, ever betide me of their own accord.
28. All union is for its disunion, and all gain is for its loss; so the health and disease and pain and pleasure come by turns, and there is nothing which is not succeeded by its reverse. Because time with its open jaws, is ever ready to devour all things.
29. The negative idea of inexistence, which is produced in the mind, from our want of reliance in the reality of things; is the very sense which is conveyed by the phrase of our ordinary unconnection with all things.
30. With this sort of the disunion of every thing in the mind, and our union with the society of high minded men; and disassociation with the vile and unrighteous, and association with spiritual knowledge:—
31. These joined with the continual exertion of our manliness in our habitual practice of these virtues, one assuredly arrives to the certain knowledge of what he seeks (i.e. his god), as clearly as he sees a globe set in his hands.
32. The knowledge of the supreme author of creation, sitting beyond the ocean of the universe, and watching over its concerns; impresses us with the belief, that it is not I but God that does every thing in the world, and that there is nothing that is done here by me, but by the great God Himself.
33. Having left aside the thought of one's self agency on any act, whoso sits quiet silent and tranquil in himself, such a one is said to be absolutely unconnected with every thing in the world.
34. He that does not reside within or without anything, nor dwells above or beneath any object; who is not situated in the sky, or in any side or part of the all surrounding air and space; who is not in anything or in nothing, and neither in gross matter nor in the sensible spirit.
35. Who is present and manifest in every thing, without being expressed in any; and who pervades all things like the clear firmament, who is without beginning and end and birth and death. Whoso seeks this Lord of all, is said to be set in the best part of this stage.
36. Contentment is as sweet fragrance in the mind, and virtuous acts are as handsome as the leaves of a flower; the heart string is as stalk beset by the thorns of cares and anxieties, and thralls with the gusts of dangers and difficulties.
37. The flower of inward discrimination, is expanded like the lotus-bud, by the sun-beams of reason, and produces the fruit of resignation in the garden of the third stage of yoga-practice.
38. As it is by association with holy men, and by means of the assemblage of virtuous acts, that one arrives on a sudden to the first stage of yoga:—
39. So is this first step to be preserved with care, and grown up like a tender sprout, with the watering of reasoning at its root (in order to lead it to the succeeding steps or stages).
40. The yoga practitioner like a good gardener, must foster the rising plant of spiritual knowledge, by the daily application of reasoning to every part of it. (The parts of the plant of spirituality, are its dispassionateness, unworldliness and the like, which require to be reared up by proper reasoning).
41. This stage being well managed, and all its parts being properly performed, introduces the succeeding stages (all of which depend on the first as their basis).
42. Now the better state of the third stage, as it has been already described, is one of all desires and arrogations in the mind of the yogi.
43. Ráma said:—Now tell me sir, what is the way of the salvation of an ignorant man, of one of a base birth, and addicted to baseness himself; who has never associated with the yogis, nor received any spiritual instruction.
44. Who has never ascended on any of the first, second or succeeding stages of yoga, and is dead in the like state of ignorance in which he was born.
45. Vasishtha replied:—The ignorant man that has never attained to any of the states of yoga in his whole life, is carried by the current of his transmigration to rove in a hundred births, until he happens by some chance or other, to get some glimpse of spiritual light in any one of them.
46. Or it may be that one happens to be dissatisfied with the world, by his association with holy men; and the resignation which springs thereby, becomes the ground of one of the stages of his yoga.
47. By this means, the man is saved from this miserable world; because it is the united voice of all the sástras, that an embodied being is released from death, no sooner he has passed through any one stage of yoga (or union with his maker).
48. The performance of a part only of some of the stages of yoga, is enough for the remission of past sins; and for conducting the expurgated person to the celestial abode in a heavenly car. (The wicked man turning from his wickedness, and doing what is right and saveth his soul).
49. He enjoys the Parnassian groves of Sumeru in company with his beloved, when the weight of his righteous acts, outweighs those of unrighteousness.
50. The yogi, released from the trap of his temporal enjoyments, and has passed his allotted period; expires in due time, to be reborn in the houses of yogis and rich men, or in the private mansions of learned, good and virtuous people.
51. Being thus born, he betakes himself to the habitual practice of the yoga of his former birth; and has the wisdom to begin at once at the stage to which he was practiced, and which was left unfinished before (hence arises the difference in the capacities of youth).
52. These three stages, Ráma, are designated the waking state; because the yogi retains in them his perception of the differences of things, as a waking man perceives the visible to differ from one another.
53. Men employed in yoga acquire a venerable dignity (in their very appearance), which induce the ignorant to wish for their liberation also (in order to attain to the same rank).
54. He is reckoned a venerable man, who is employed in all honorable deeds, and refrains from what is dishonourable, who is steadfast in the discharge of all his social duties, whether they are of the ordinary kind or occasional ones.
55. He who acts according to customary usage, and the ordinances of sástras; who act conscientiously and according to his position; and thus dispenses all his affairs in the world, is verily called a venerable man.
56. The venerableness of yogis germinates in the first stage, it blossoms in the second, and becomes fruitful in the third stage of yoga.
57. The venerable yogi dying in state of yoga, comes first to enjoy the fruition of good desires for a long time (in his next birth); and then becomes a yogi again (for the completion of his yoga).
58. The practice of the parts enjoyed in the three first stages of yoga, serves to destroy at first the ignorance of the yogi, and then sheds the light of true knowledge in his mind, as brightly as the beams of full-moon illume the sky at night.
59. He who devotes his mind to yoga, with his undivided attention from first to last, and sees all things in one even and same light, is said to have arrived to the fourth stage of yoga.
60. As the mistake of duality disappears from sight, and the knowledge of unity shines supremely bright; the yogi is said in this state to have reached the fourth stage of yoga, when he sees the world as a vision in his dream.
61. The first three stages, are represented as the waking state of the yogi; but the fourth is said to be the state of his dreaming, when the visibles disappear from his sight; as the dispersed clouds of autumn gradually vanish from sight, and as the scenes in a dream recede to nothingness.
62. They are said to be in the fifth stage, who have their minds lying dormant in them, and insensible of their bodily sensations. This is called the sleeping state or hypnotism of yoga meditation.
63. In this state there is an utter stop of feelings, of the endless varieties of things and their different species, in the mind of the yogi, who relies in his consciousness of an undivided unity only; and whose sense of a duality is entirely melted down and lost in the cheerfulness of his wakeful mind.
64. The fifth stage is likewise a state of sound sleep, when the yogi loses all his external perceptions, and sits quiet with his internal vision within himself.
65. The continued sedateness of his posture, gives him the appearance of his dormancy, and the yogi continues in this position, the practice of the mortification of all his desires.
66. This step leads gradually to the sixth stage, which is a state of insensibility both of the existence and inexistence of things as also of one's egoism and non-egoism (of his own entity and non-entity).
67. The yogi remains unmindful of everything, and quite unconscious of the unity or duality, and by being freed from every scruple and suspicion in his mind, he arrives to the dignity of living liberation. (This tetrastich is based on the sruti which says, [Sanskrit: bhidyate hadayagranyi, chidyate svvammshyayah tasmindvashte parávare]).
68. The yogi of this sort though yet inextinct or living, is said to be extinct or dead to his sensibility; he sits as a pictured lamp which emits no flame, and remains with a vacant heart and mind like an empty cloud hanging in the empty air.
69. He is full within and without him, with and amidst the fulness of divine ecstasy, like a full pot in a sea; and possest of some higher power, yet he appears as worthless on the outside.
70. After passing his sixth grade, the yogi is led to the seventh stage; which is styled a state of disembodied liberation, from its purely spiritual nature.
71. It is a state of quietude which is unapproachable (i.e. inexpressible) by words, and extends beyond the limits of this earth; it is said to resemble the state of Siva by some, and that of Brahmá by others. (The two views of the Tántrikas and Vedántists).
72. By some it is said to be the state of the androgyne deity, or the indiscriminate of the male and female powers; while others have given many other denominations to it, according to their respective fancies. (The other systems have different appellations to designate this state).
73. The seventh is the state of the eternal and incomprehensible God, and which no words can express nor explain in any way. Thus Ráma, have I mentioned to you the seven stages of yoga (each branding the other in its perfections).
74. By practice of these perfections, one evades the miseries of this world; and it is by subjection of the indomitably elephantine senses, that one can arrive to these perfections.
75. Hear me relate to you Ráma, of a furious elephant, which with its protruded tusks, was ever ready to attack others.
76. And as this elephant was about to kill many men, unless it could be killed by some one of them; so are the senses of men like ferocious elephants of destruction to them.
77. Hence every man becomes victorious in all the stages of yoga, who has the valour of destroying this elephant of its sensuality the very first step of it.
78. Ráma said:—Tell me sir, who is this victorious hero in the field of battle, and what is the nature of this elephant that is his enemy, and what are these grounds of combat where he encounters him, and the manner how he foils and kills this great foe of his.
79. Vasishtha replied:—Ráma! it is our concupiscence which has the gigantic figure of this elephant, and which roams at random in the forest of our bodies, and sports in the demonstrations of all our passions and feelings.
80. It hides itself in the covert of our hearts, and has our acts for its great tusks; its fury is our ardent desire of anything, and our great ambition is its huge body.
81. All the scenes on earth are the fields for its battle, where men are often foiled in their pursuit of any.
82. The elephant of concupiscence kills members of miserly and covetous men, in the state of their wish or desire, or exertions and effort, or longing and hankering after anything.
83. In this manner does this fierce greediness, lurk in the sheath of human breast under the said several names, and it is only our forbearance from those desires, that serves as the great weapon of their destruction.
84. This ubiquious desire of our possession of everything in the world, is conquered by reflection on the ubiquity of the soul in all of them; and that the unity of my soul, stretches over and grasps all things that I covet.
85. He is doomed to suffer under the colic pain of this venomous avarice, who minds to continue in this world, in the manner as it goes on with the rest of mankind.
86. It is the mitigation of the smart poison of avarice, that is our highest wisdom, and it is our liberation, when the calm and cooling countenance of inappetency appears to our sight.
87. Words of advice stick to the sapient mind, as drops of oil adhere on glass mirror; and that our indifference to the world is the only preventive of its thorns, and is the best advice to the wise.
88. It is as advisable to destroy a desire by the weapon of indifference, no sooner it rises in the breast, as it is proper to root out the sprout of a poisonous plant, before it spreads itself on the ground.
89. The concupiscent soul, is never freed from its miserliness; while the mere effort of one's indifference, makes it set quiet in itself (without cringing at others).
90. It is by your carelessness about everything, and by your lying down as supine as a dead carcass, that you can kill your desire by the weapon of your indifference, as they catch and kill fishes with hooks (by sitting silent beside some pond or lake).
91. Let this be mine or that I may have it, is what is called desire by the wise; and the want of every desire for wealth &c., is called resignation by them.
92. Know that the remembrance of some thing, is alike the desire of having the same in one's possession again; and it includes both what was enjoyed before or next.
93. O high minded Ráma, you must learn to remain as a block in your mind, by forgetting whatever you think of or otherwise; all of which must be buried in oblivion, for your estrangement from the world. (Retire, the world shut out, imagination's airy wing repress—Young).
94. Who will not lift up his arms, and have his hairs standing at their end, to hear and reflect in himself that, want of desire is the summum bonum of every one's desire. (Desire of nothing is the most desirable thing, is a paralogism in logic).
95. It is by sitting quite silent and quiet, that one attains to the state of his supreme felicity, a state before which the sovereignty of the world seems as a straw.
96. As a traveller traverses on foot through many regions, in order to reach to his destination, so the yogi passes through all his ordinary acts, to reach his goal of final bliss.
97. What is the good of using many words, when it can be expressed in a few; that our desire is our strongest bondage, and its want our complete liberation.
98. Now Ráma, rest quiet in your joy, with knowing that all this creation is full of the increate, everlasting, undecaying and tranquil spirit of God; and sit quiet and delighted in yourself with viewing the visibles in their spiritual sense.
99. Know that it is the ignoring of every thing and the quiet posture of the yogi, which is called as yoga by the spiritual; and continue to discharge your duties even in your yoga state, until you get rid of them by the privation of your desires.
100. It is also the unconsciousness of one's self, which is likewise styled yoga by the wise; and it consists of the entire absorption of one's self in the supreme, by wasting away his mind and all its operations.
101. Again this self absorption is the conceiving of one's self, as he is the all pervasive spirit of Siva, which is increate, self-conscious and ever benevolent to all. This conception of one's self is tantamount to his renunciation of every thing besides himself.
102. He who has the sense of his egoism and meism (i.e. that this is I and these are mine), is never released from the miseries of life; it is the negation of this sensation that produces our liberation, and therefore it is at the option of every body, to do either this or that for his bondage or salvation.
Admonition to Bharadwája.
Argument:—Relation of the Quietude of Ráma, and the Queries of Bharadwája; with further description of states of waking and others, and of the ultimate turíya condition of the fourth stage of yoga.
BHARADWAJA asked:—Válmíki saying:—Tell me sir, what did Ráma do after hearing the lecture of the sage; whether he with his enlightened understanding put any other question, or remained in his ecstatic quietude with his full knowledge of yoga and the supreme soul.
2. And what did next that supremely blest yogi (Vasishtha) do, who is adored by all and honoured even by Gods; who is a personification of pure understanding, and free from the state of birth and death; who is fraught with every good quality and kindly disposed for ever to the welfare and preservation of the peoples in all the three worlds.
3. Válmíki replied:—After hearing the lecture of Vasishtha, combining the essence of the vedánta philosophy, the lotus-eyed Ráma became perfectly acquainted with the full knowledge of yoga.
4. He felt the failing of his bodily strength, and the falling of the members of his body, he stared with his glaring eyes, and his clear intellect was shrouded under a cloud. He awoke in a moment from his entranced state, and felt a flood of rapturous joy within himself.
5. He forgot the fashion of putting his questions, and hearing their answers; his mind was full with the ambrosial draught of delight, and the hairs of his body stood up like prickles in his horripilation.
6. An inexpressibly ineffable light overspreads his intellect with its unusual glare; which cast the bright prospects of the eight dignities of yoga into utter shade. (The eight dignities—(ashta-siddhis) are so many perfections arrived at by practice of yoga).
7. In this way did Ráma attain the supereminent state of Siva, in which he sat sedate without uttering a word.
8. Bharadwája said:—Oh! how much I wonder at such a high dignity, which Ráma had attained; and how much I regret at the impossibility of its attainment, by a dull and ignorant sinner as myself.
9. Tell me, O great sage, how it may be possible for me to attain to that stage of perfection, which it is impossible for the gods Brahmá and others to arrive at any time; and tell me likewise, how I may get over the unfordable ocean of earthly troubles.
10. Válmíki replied:—It is by your perusal of the history of Ráma from its first to last, and by your following the dictates of Vasishtha as given in these lectures; as also by your consideration of their true sense and purport in your understanding, that you may be able to attain to the state that you desire. This is all that I can tell you at present.
11. The world is an exhibition of our ignorance, and there is no truth in aught that we see in it; it is a display of our error only, wherefore it is entirely disregarded by the wise, and so much regarded by fools.
12. There is no entity of anything here, beside that of the divine Intellect; why then are you deluded by the visibles, learn their secrets and have a clear understanding. (or have the clearness of your understanding).
13. The perception of the delusive phenomenals, resembles the waking dream of day dreamers; and he alone is said to be waking, who has the lamp of his intellect ever burning within himself.
14. The world is based on vacuity, and it ends in vacuum also; its midmost part being vacuous likewise, there is no reliance placed upon it by the intelligent and wise.
15. Our primeval ignorance (avidyá) being accompanied by our primordial desires, it presents all what is inexistent as existing in our presence; just as our fancy paints an Utopia or fairy city to our view, and as our sleep shows its multifarious dreams before us.
16. Being unpracticed to taste the sweet plantain of your beneficent intellect, you are deluded greedily to devour the delirious drug of your desire, and make yourself giddy with draughts of its poisonous juice.
17. He who lays hold on true knowledge for his support, never falls down into the pit of ignorance during his wakeful state; and those who depend on their subjective consciousness alone (as in the turíya or fourth stage of yoga), stand above all the other states (of fallibility).
18. So long as the adepts in yoga, do not plunge themselves (lit.—their souls), in the fresh and sweet waters of the great fountain of their consciousness; they must be exposed to the boisterous waves of the dangerous ocean of this world. (Spiritual knowledge alone saves a man from the troubles of life).
19. That which has no existence before, nor will remain to exist afterwards (such as all created and perishable things in the world); must be understood to be inexistent in the interim also, as our night dreams and fleeting thoughts that are never in being, and so is this world and whatever is seen in it.
20. All things are born of our ignorance, as the bubbles are swollen by the air; they glisten and move about for a moment, and then melt into the sea of our knowledge.
21. Find out the stream of the cooling waters of your consciousness, and plunge yourself deep into it; and drive out all external things from you, as they shut out the warm and harmful sun-beams from their houses.
22. The one ocean of ignorance surrounds and over floods the world, as the single salt sea girds and washes the whole island; and the distinctions of ego and tu etc., are the waves of this salt sea of our erroneousness.
23. The emotions of the mind, and its various feelings and passions, are the multiform billows of this sea of ignorance; our egoism or selfishness is the great whirlpool, in which the self willed man is hurled of his own accord.
24. His love and hatred are the two sharks, that lay hold of him in their jaws; and drag him at last into the depth (or to his death), which no body can prevent.
25. Go and plunge yourself in the calm and cooling sea of your solitude, and wash your soul in the nectareous waters of your ambrosial solity; dive and dive deep in the depth of unity, and fly from the salt sea of duality, and the brackish waves of diversities.
26. Who is lasting in this world, and who is passing from it, who is related to anyone, and what does one derive from another; why are you drowned in your delusion, rise and be wakeful (to your spiritual concerns).
27. Know thyself as that one and very soul, which is said to be diffused all over the world; say what other thing is there except that and beside thee, that you should regret or lament for (since the one soul is all and that is thyself, thou hast all in thee, and there is nothing for thee to regret that thou hast not or dost require to have).
28. Brahma appears to the ignorant boys, to be diffused through all the worlds; but the learned always rely on the undiffused felicitous soul of God.
29. It is the case of unreasonable men, to grieve as well as to be pleased on a sudden and without cause; but the learned are always joyous, and it is a sad thing to find them in error.
30. The truth of the nice subtility of the divine soul, is hid from eyes of the ignorant; and they are as doubtful about its nature, as men are suspicious of land and water where they are not. (Water appears as ground in dark, and sand seems as water in the barren desert).
31. See the great bodies of the earth, air, water and sky, which are composed of atomic particles, to be so durable as to last for ever; why then mourn at the loss of anything in the world (which is never lost at all).
32. From nothing comes nothing, and something cannot become nothing; it is only the appearance of the form, which takes place in the substance of things.
33. But it is by virtue of the prior acts in the former births of men, that they are reborn in different shapes to enjoy or suffer the results of those acts; adore therefore the lord God and author of the worlds, who is always bountiful and bestower of all blessings.
34. The worship of this God destroys all our sins, and cuts off the knots of snares of this world.
35. You may worship Him in some form or other, until your mind is cleared and your nature is purified; and then you can resort to the transcendent spirit of the formless Deity.
36. Having overcome the impervious gloom of ignorance, by force of the purity of thy nature; you may pursue the course of the yoga, with the contrition of your inner soul, and belief in the sástras (and in the dictates of your spiritual guide).
37. Then sit a moment in your fixed meditation (samádhi), and behold the transcendent spirit in thy own spirit; in this state the dark night of your former ignorance, will break forth into open and bright daylight.
38. It must be by one's manly exertion or by virtue of the meritorious acts of former births only, as also by grace of the great God, that men may obtain the obtainable one. (The unknown God is said to be knowable and obtainable by yoga only).
39. It is neither the birth nor character, nor the good manners nor valour of a man, that ensures him his success in any undertaking, except it be by the merit of his acts in former births.
40. Why sit you so sad to think of the events of inscrutable and unavoidable fate, since there is no power nor that of God himself to efface what has been already written destined in the forehead (or luck) of anybody. (Fate overrules even Jove himself).
41. Where is the expounder of intellectual science, and where is the pupil that can comprehend it fully; what is this creeping plant of ignorance, and what is this inscrutable destiny, that joins two things together, are questions too difficult to be solved.
42. O Bharadwája! Let your reason assist you to overcome your illusion, and then you will no doubt gain an uncommon share of wisdom.
43. See how a high mettled hero overpowers on all his imminent dangers, and stretches his conquest far and wide; and behold on the other hand, how a mean spirited man is tried and grieves at the ordinary casualties of life.
44. A good understanding is the result of, and attendant upon the meritorious deeds of many lives; as it appears in the acts of wise men, and in the lives of all living liberated persons.
45. Know my son, that the same action is fraught both with your freedom as well as bondage, accordingly as it proves favourable or adverse to you. (As true faith is attended with salvation, but false faith or hypocrisy with damnation).
46. The righteous acts of virtuous men, serve to destroy the sins of their past lives; as the showers of rain water, extinguish the flame of a conflagration in the forest.
47. But my friend, I would advise you rather to avoid your religious acts, and attach your mind to the meditation of Brahma, if you want to avoid your falling into the deep eddy of this world. (Because all actions bind a man to the world over and over again).
48. So long as one is attached to the outer world, being led to it by his insatiable desires, or so long as one is led by the insatiable desires of his mind, to attach himself to the outer world; he is exposed to the contrary wind and waves of the sea, and has only to find his rest in the calm water of his loneliness.
49. Why do you lean so much upon your sorrow only to blind your understanding, rather support yourself on the strong staff of your good understanding, and it will never break under you.
50. Those who are reckoned in the number of the great men, never allow themselves to be altered and moved by their joy or grief; and to be carried away like straws by the current of the river.
51. Why do you sorrow, friend, for these people, who are swinging in the cradle of the circumstance of life in the dark night of this world, and playing their several parts with giddy amusement.
52. Look at the gamesome time, that sports joyously in this world, with the slaughter and production of endless beings by turns.
53. There is no body of any age or sex for his game in particular, he chases all in general like the all devouring dragon.
54. Why talk of mortal men and other animals, that live to die in a moment; even the whole body of gods (said to be immortals), are under the clutches of the remorseless and relentless death.
55. Why do you dance and make yourself merry in your amusement, when you are in danger of losing by degrees the powers of your body and limbs; sit but silently for a while, and see the drama of the course of this world (combining its comedy and tragedy together).
56. Seeing the ever varying scenes of this changeful theatre of the world, the wise spectator, O good Bharadwája, never shrinks nor shudders for a moment (knowing such to be its nature).
57. Shun your unwelcomed sorrow, and seek for the favourable amidst all that is unfavourable; nor sadden the clear and cheerful countenance of your soul, which is of the nature of the perfectly blissful intellect of God.
58. Bear always your reverence towards the gods, Bráhmans and your superiors; and be a friend even to irrational animals; in order to meet with the grace of God, according to the dicta of the vedas (that the grace is the leader to the light of truth, and thereby to the way of liberation).
59. Bharadwája rejoined:—I have known by your kindness all these and much more of such truths, and come to find that, there is not a greater friend to us than our indifference to the world, nor a greater enemy than this world itself to us.
60. I want to learn at present the substance of all the knowledge, which was imparted by the sage Vasishtha, in many works of great verbosity.
61. Válmíki answered:—Hear now, Bharadwája, of the highest knowledge (which is taught by that sage) for the salvation of mankind; and the hearing of which will save you from your drowning in the iniquities of the world.
62. First bow down to that supreme being, who is of the nature of the sole entity combined with intellect and felicity; (all which are his forms in the abstract), and who is ever existent with his attributes of creation, sustentation and destruction: (which are said to be so many states of himself).
63. I will tell you in short, and upon the authority of the sruti; how you may come to the knowledge of the first principle, and the manner in which it exhibits itself in the acts of creation, preservation and destruction of the universe.
64. But tell me first, how you have lost your remembrance of what I have told you on this subject; since it is possible by your reconsideration of all that from first to last, to know every thing from your own memory, as they have a survey of the earth from a small globe in their hand.
65. Now consider all this in your own mind, and you will get the truth which will prevent all your sorrows; associate moreover with the learned and study the best books, which with the help of your reasoning and resignation, may lead you to endless felicity.
Resuscitation of Ráma.
Argument.—Bharadwája's Enlightenment and the duties of the Enlightened.
VÁLMIKI continued:—The yogi should be peaceful and tranquil, and exempt from all forbidden acts and those proceeding from a desire of fruition; he must avoid all sensual gratifications, and have his belief in God and his holy religion of the vedas.
2. He must rest quiet in his seat, and have his mind and members of the body under his control; and continue to repeat the syllable Om, until his mind is cleared (from all its doubts).
3. He must then restrain his respiration, for the purification of his inner organs (the heart and mind); and then restrict his senses by degrees, from their respective outward objects.
4. He must think on the natures and causes of its body and its organs of sense, of his mind and its understanding, as also of his soul and its consciousness; and repeat the srutis or the holy texts which relate to these subjects.
5. Let him sit reclined in the meditation of Virát, the God of visible nature at first, and then in the internal soul of nature; next to this he must meditate on the formless spirit, as a part and abstracted from all; and at last fix his mind in the supreme cause alone. (Rising from the concrete to the discrete deity).
6. Let him cast off in his mind, the earthly substance of his flesh and bones to the earth; and commit the liquid part of his blood to the water, and the heat of his body to fire.
7. He is then to consign the airy and vacuous parts of his body to air and vacuum, and after having thus made over his elemental parts to the five elements; he shall deliver the organs of his sense to the particular divinities from whom they are derived.
8. The ears and other organs, which are for the reception of their respective from all sides, being cast aside on all sides, he is to give the skin of his body to electricity (which imparts to it the sensations of heat and cold by the electric shock).
9. Let him then resign his eye sight to the solar disc, and his tongue to water, he must next give up his breath to air, his voice to fire, and his palms to the god Indra (water and fire mean Varuna and Agni—the regent gods of these elements).
10. He must then offer his feet to the god Vishnu, and his anus to Mithra; and after giving up his penis to Kasyapa, he should dedicate his mind to the moon.
11. He must afterwards lay down his understanding to Brahmá, and the other inward faculties to special divinities, and at last abdicate his outer senses also to their presiding duties.
12. Having thus resigned his whole body to the gods, he should think himself as the all comprehending Viráta; and this he must do in pursuance to the dictates of the veda, and not of his own will or fabrication.
13. The lord that embodies the whole universe in himself, in his androgynous form of half-male and half-female, is said to be the source and support of all sorts of beings.
14. He was born in the form of creation, and it is he that is settled in everything in the universe; and caused this earth to appear from the bipartite mundane egg, as also the water which is twice as much as the land.
15. He produced the heat twice as much as the water, and the air also which is double in its volume to that of heat, and lastly the vacuum which is twice more in its extent than the air which it contains. Each latter one lying next above the former. (So the sruti:—each succeeding one is above its preceding element).
16. These form the world whether they are divided or undivided from their succeeding and surrounding ones; the earth being girt by the sea, and the same by submarine fire.
17. Thus the yogi by contracting his thought of the former one under the latter, will engross his thought of heat under that of air, and this again under his idea of vacuum, which last is swallowed up by his thought of the great cause of all.
18. In this manner must the yogi remain for a moment in his spiritual form only, by contraction of his corporeal body (composed of the elemental particles, his desires and prior acts and his primeval ignorance—avidyá), under the same (because the material part is contained under the spiritual, and not the latter under the former as it is erroneously supposed by materialist).
19. The spiritual body is represented by the wise, to be composed of the ten senses of perception and conception, the mind or memory and the understanding faculties; which is above and outside the corporeal half of the mundane egg. The yogi must think himself to be this supermundane spiritual being. (This form is styled Hiranyagarbha).
20. The former or intramundane half, which is composed of the quadruple subtile elements, is represented by the figure of the four faced Brahmá; and differs from the former by its being an evolution of unevolved spirit.
21. That nameless and formless being in which the world subsists, is called Prakriti or matter by some, and Máyá or delusion by others, and also as atoms by atomic philosophers.
22. The same is said to be ignorance—avidyá, by agnostics, whose minds are confused by false reasoning; and it is after all that hidden and unknowable something, in which all things are dissolved at the ultimate dissolution of the world.
23. Again everything which is quite unrelated with the divine spirit and intellect (i.e. material substance); comes to existence at the recreation of the world; and retains and remains in its primary form to the end of the world.
24. Think of creation in the direct method, and of its destruction in the reversed order; and then betake yourself to the fourth stage of turíya, after you have passed over the three preceding steps. (The direct method of creation is the procedure from vacuity to air, and thence to heat, water and earth; or the meditation of the creative power under the three hypostasis or substantiality of Hiranyagarbha, Brahmá and Prakriti; and the reversed order is the annihilation of these in the quiet state of the unpredicable Deity).
25. And in order to that state of blissfulness, you must enter into the supreme spirit by removing from your mind all its impressions (lingas), of matter and sense, mind and understanding and all desires and acts; that lie unexpanded and hidden in it.
26. Bharadwája responded:—I am now quite released from the fetters of my impressions, as my intellectual part has found its entrance into the sea of turíya or transcendent blissfulness.
27. The indistinct nature of my soul from the supreme spirit, makes me identic to it; and I find myself to be devoid of all attributes, and only an intellectual power like the same (the human soul being as intelligent a principle as the divine).
28. As the vacuity contained in the hollow of a pot, becomes one with the universal and all pervading vacuum after the pitcher is broken; so the human soul vanishes into the supreme spirit, after it flies from the confines of the body after its destruction.
29. As a fire brand being cast into the burning furnace, becomes the one and same fire with it; so the kind mixing with its kind, becomes indistinctly known under common name, one: (Here we have the axiom, the even being added to the even, whole is even).
30. Again as straws swimming in the salt sea, are transformed to the sea salt; so all animal souls and the inanimate even mixing with the divine soul, become animated also. (Here is opposite dogma of unequals being equal; because the greater includes the less under it).
31. As saltpetre being thrown into the sea, looses its name and nature and becomes the sea salt; so everything is swallowed in the universal soul and assimilated to it.
32. As water mixing with water, salt with salt, and butter with butter; lose their distinctions and not their substances; so my self and all other substances mixing with the divine spirit, lose our distinct appellations without losing our substantialities.
33. All bodies being absorbed in the all-knowing and ever blissful intellect of the great creator of all; become equally all pervading and tranquil and everlasting and blessed for ever.