CHAPTER IX. REFLECTIONS OF JANAKA.
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Valmiki and Mitra, Viharilala
40. We have serpents creeping in the cells of our hearts, and have our bodies filled with the brambles of diseases and dangers, and know not how to destroy them.
41. I see good is intermixed with evil, and pain abiding with pleasure; there is sorrow seated on the top (excess) of joy, so I know not whereto I shall resort.
42. I see the earth full of common people, who are incessantly born and dying in it in multitudes; but I find few honest and righteous men in it.
43. These beautiful forms of women, with their eyes like lotuses, and the gracefulness of their blandishments, and their charming smiles, are made so soon to fade and die away.
44. Of what note am I among these mighty beings (as Brahmá and Vishnu), who at the twinkling of their eyes, have created and destroyed the world; and yet have succumbed to death at last. (This last passage shows that the Hindu gods were mortal heroes of antiquity).
45. You are constantly in search of what is more pleasant and lasting than others, but never seek after that highest prosperity, which is beyond all your earthly cares.
46. What is this great prosperity in which you take so much delight, but mere vexation of your spirit, which proves this vanity to be your calamity only.
47. Again what are these adversities which you fear so much, they may turn to your true prosperity, by setting you free from earthly broils and leading you to your future felicity.
48. The mind is broken to pieces by its fears, like the fragments of the moon, floating on the waves of this ocean of the world. Its selfishness has tossed it to and fro, and this world being got rid of, it is set at perfect ease (from all vicissitudes of fortune).
49. There is an unavoidable chance (necessity), actuating our worldly affairs and accidents; it is impudence therefore to welcome some as good, and to avoid others as evil.
50. We are prone to things that are pleasant to the sight, but bear a mortal flame in them, and consume us like poor moths in the flames, which it is bright to see but fatal to feel.
51. It is better to roll in the continual flame of hell-fire to which one is habituated, than rise and fall repeatedly in the furnace of this world, as from the frying pan into the fire.
52. This world is said by the wise, to be a boundless ocean of woes (vale of tears); how then can any body who has fallen amidst it, expect any happiness herein?
53. Those who have not fallen in the midst and been altogether drowned in woe, think the lesser woes as light and delight, as one condemned to be beheaded, is glad to escape with a light punishment.
54. I am grown as the vilest of the vile, and resemble a block of wood or stone; there is no difference in me from the ignorant clown, who has never had the thought of his eternal concerns in his head.
55. The great arbour of the world, with its very many branches and twigs and fruits, hath sprung from the mind and is rooted in it. (The outer world has its existence in the sensitive mind only; because the insensible bodies of the dead and inanimate things, have no consciousness of it).
56. It is the conception (sankalpa) of the world, in my mind, that causes its existence and presents its appearance before me, I will now try to efface this conception from my mind, and forget this world altogether. (This doctrine of idealism was derived, by Janaka from his own Intuition (Svena-Jnátena)).
57. I will no longer allow myself to be deluded like monkeys with the forms of things, which I know are not real; mere ideal, but changeful and evanescent. (Here also Janaka learns by intuition not to rely on concrete forms, but to have their general and abstract ideas).
58. I have woven and stretched out the web of my desires, and collected only my woes and sorrows; I fell into and fled from the snare of my own making, and am now resolved to take my rest in the soul.
59. I have much wailed and bitterly wept, to think of the depravity and loss of my soul, and will henceforth cease to lament, thinking that I am not utterly lost.
60. I am now awakened, and am glad to find out the robber of my soul; it is my own mind, and this I am determined to kill, as it had so long deprived me of the inestimable treasure of my soul.
61. So long was my mind at large as a loose and unstrung pearl, now will I pierce it with the needle of reason, and string it with the virtues of self-controul and subjection to wisdom.
62. The cold icicle of my mind, will now be melted down by the sun-heat of reason; and will now be confined in the interminable meditation of its Eternal Maker (from where it cannot return. Sruti).
63. I am now awakened to my spiritual knowledge, like these holy Siddhas, saints and sages; and will now pursue my spiritual inquiries, to the contentment of my soul.
64. Having now found my long-lost soul, I will continue to look upon its pure light with joy in my lonely retirement; and will remain as quiet and still in contemplation of it, as a motionless cloud in autumn.
65. And having cast away the false belief of my corporeality (i.e. of being an embodied being), and that these possessions and properties are mine, and having subdued my force by mighty enemy of the Mind, I will attain the tranquility of my soul by the help of my reason.