CHAPTER XI.
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Valmiki and Mitra, Viharilala
39. There is nobody nor being beside the being of Brahma, as there is no wave nor foam or froth of the sea beside the water of the deep.
40. As the billows and waves, the surges and eddies, and their froths and foams, and bubbles and minute particles, are all formations of water in the great body of waters; so are all beings but productions of the spirit in the Infinite spirit. (All matter is reduced to the spirits, and the spirits are consolidated to material substances by chemical process).
41. All bodies with their various modes, and organs of sense and their several functions, and all visible objects and their growth and decay, together with every thing conducing to our happiness and misery, and all other energies and their gains, are the works of Brahma in himself. (i.e. they are the self reflective acts of gods and not done for the sake of others).
42. The production of these various beings in esse, is from the essence of Brahma; as the formation of different ornaments, is from the substance of gold. There is no other formal cause or formation distinct from Brahma, and the distinction of the cause and its creation, is the erroneous conception of the ignorant.
43. The mind, understanding, egoism, and the elemental atoms, and the organs of sense, are all the various forms of Brahma; wherefore there is cause of our joy or grief.
44. The words I, thou, he, and this and that, as also the terms of the mind and matter, are all significant of the self-same Brahma átmátmani, in the same manner as the roaring of a cloud in the hills, resounds in a hundred echoes through their caverns. (All words applied to every thing, relate to the one self-same Brahma who is all in all to pan).
45. Brahma appears as an unknown stranger to us, through our ignorance of him, as the visions seen in a dream by our mind itself, appear foreign to us. (i.e. Our belief in the visibles is the cause of our disbelief in the invisible God; as our familiarity with the objects of our waking state, makes us reject our visionary dreams as false).
46. Ignorance of Brahmá as Brahma or what he is, makes men to reject divine knowledge altogether; as our ignorance of the quality of gold causes us to cast it off dross. (Brahma to the brute is, as the gem in the dung hill cast away by the silly cock).
47. Brahma is known as the Supreme spirit and sole Lord, by those who are acquainted with divine knowledge; but he is said to be unknown and involved in ignorance by them that are ignorant of Him.
48. Brahma being known as Brahma, becomes manifested such in a moment; just as gold when known as such, is taken in due esteem.
49. Those who are versed in divine knowledge, know Brahma as without a cause and causing nothing by himself, and that he is free from decay, and is the Supreme spirit and sole Lord of all.
50. He who can meditate in himself, on the omnipotence of Supreme spirit of Brahma; comes to behold him as such in a short time, even without a leader to guide him in his spiritual knowledge (one's own faith in Divine Omnipotence, is the surest means to the sight of his Maker).
51. The want of divine knowledge, that is called the ignorance of the ignorant; whereas it is the knowledge of God, that constitutes the true knowledge which removes the ignorance.
52. As an unknown friend is no friend at all, until he is recognized as such, after removal of one's forgetfulness; so God is no God to one, as long he continues in ignorance of Him.
53. We can then only know God, when the mind comes to perceive the unconnection of the soul with the body; and whereby it alienates itself from all worldly connections in disgust.
54. It is then that we come to know the one true God, when the mind is freed from its knowledge of duality; and by its distaste of dualism, it abandons its attachment to the world.
55. We then come to the knowledge of God, when we come to know ourselves to be other than our persons; and when by getting rid of our personal egoism, we forsake our affection for this unkindred world.
56. It is then that the thought of God rises in our minds, when we come to the true knowledge of thinking ourselves the same with Brahma; and when the mind is absorbed in the meditation of the divine truth in one's self. (This is the sublimation of the Yogi to the divine state; or when the Yogi loses himself, in his rapturous vision on the one God. This kind of meditation is indicated in the formula "Soham" in Vedánta and an ald Huq in sufism).
57. God being known as the tout ensemble or comprising the whole plenum, we come to believe the same as Brahma; and losing our egoism and tuism in the same, we come to the knowledge of that entity only comprising the entire universe. (This belief of the entirety of the Deity, is expressed in the words "Tat Sat" corresponding with to on, idest, alast, that is, He in the creeds of other people).
58. When I come to know this true and omniform Brahma, as all in all, and forming the entire whole; I become released from all my sorrow and grief, and am set free from all my delusion and desire, and the responsibility of my duties (from the belief of God's agency in all things).
59. I am quite calm and at ease and without any sorrow or grief, by my knowledge of the truth, that I am no other than Brahma Himself; I am as cool as the moon, without her spots and phases in me, and I am the all entire, without any disease, decay or diminution in me. (This is said with regard to the universal soul, which engrosses all souls and things in itself).
60. It is true that I am the all pervading Brahma, and therefore I can neither wish to have or leave any thing from me; being of myself the blood, bones and flesh of my body. (The soul is the source of the body, and the spirit its life, without which it decays and dies away).
61. It is true that I am Brahma the universal soul, and therefore the intellect, mind and sensibility also; I am the heaven and sky with their luminaries and quarters and the nether worlds also.
62. It is true that I am Brahma, composing this pot and painting, these bushes and brambles, these forests and their grass, as also the seas and their waves. (One God is manifest in many forms).
63. The unity of Brahma is a certain truth, and it is the ego which is manifest in the seas and mountains and all living beings; and in the qualities of reception and emission, and of extension and contraction in all material bodies. (It is the Divinity that actuates the physical powers in nature).
64. All things of extended forms situated in the intellectual spirit of Brahma, who is the cause of the growth of creepers and plants, and of the germination of vegetative seeds.
65. The supreme Brahma resides in his sheath of the intellectual soul, in the manner of flavour in the cup of the flower; and thence diffuses itself on all sides in the form of everything everywhere.
66. He that is known as only soul of all, and who is ascertained as the supreme spirit, and who is designated by the appellations of the intellectual soul, Brahma the great, the only entity and reality, the Truth and Intelligence and apart from all.
67. He is said to be the all-inhering element, and Intelligence only without the intelligibles in it; He is the pure light that gives every being its consciousness of itself.
68. He appears to the spiritualist to be existent everywhere, as the tranquil and intelligent Brahma; and contains in himself the powers of all the faculties of the mind and body, such as the understanding and the organs of sense, so the sruti; "He is the mind of the mind, the sight of the eye." [Sanskrit: yascat?u sascat?unmanásá manoyadityádi].
69. Give up the thought of thy difference from Brahma by knowing thyself as the reflexion of the intelligent soul; which is the cause of the causes of the existence of the world. Such as vacuum and others, which are causes of sound and are caused by vacuous spirit of God (and not as the vacuists and materialists belief them, to be increate essences from eternity).
70. The intellect of Brahma is the transparent receptacle of all essences, and my ego is of the same essence, which exudes continually as a shower of rain, from the transparent spirit of God.
71. I am that light which shines in the souls of yogis, and I am that silent spirit which is supported by the ambrosial drops of Divine Intellect; which continually distils its nectarious juice into our souls, as we may feel in ourselves.
72. I am as a wheel or circle without having the beginning or end of myself, and by having the pure intellect of Brahma in me. I am quiet in my deep sleep of samádhi meditation, and I perceive holy light shining within me. (The yogi in his devotion is absorbed in the calmness of his soul and is wrapt in divine light).
73. The thought that I am Brahma, affords afar greater delight to the soul, than the taste of any sweet meat, which gives but a momentary delight, so the sruti:—God is all sweetness [Sanskrit: rasobetat] (sweet is the memory of a friend, and sweeter far must be the thought of God, who is best and greatest friend).
74. One knowing his soul and intellect, knows the indestructible Brahma and himself as identic with the same; as one whose mind is possessed with the image of his beloved, beholds her bright countenance in the shining orb of the moon.
75. As the sights of earthly people are fixed in the etherial moon, so the sight of intellectual beings, is fixed in the supreme and indestructible soul, which he knows as self-same with himself.
76. The intellectual power which is situated in the vacuity of the heart, is verily the verity of the immaculate Brahma himself. Its pleasure and pain, and mutability and divisibility, are attributed to by ignorance only.
77. The soul that has known the truth, knows himself as the supreme Intellect, as the pilgrim on the way sees only his saint before him, and no intermediate object besides.
78. The belief that I am the pure and all pervading intellect, is attended with the purity and holiness of the soul, and the knowledge of the Divine power as the cause of the union of earth, air and water in the production of the germ of creation, is the main creed of all creeds.