CHAPTER XXXIV. PRAHLÁDA’S SELF KNOWLEDGE OF SPIRITUALISM.
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Valmiki and Mitra, Viharilala
Argument. Prahláda’s meditations and attainment of spiritual knowledge by the blessing of Vishnu.
The Lord said:—O thou rich jewel on the crown of the Daitya race! Receive thy desired boon of me for alleviation of thy worldly afflictions.
2. Prahláda replied:—What better blessing can I ask of thee, my Lord! than to instruct me in what thou thinkest thy best gift, above all other treasures of the world, and which is able to requite all our wants in this miserable life.
3. The Lord answered:—Mayst thou have a sinless boy! and may thy right discrimination of things, lead thee to thy rest in God, and the attainment of thy Supreme felicity, after dispersion of thy earthly cares, and the errors of this world.
4. Vasishtha rejoined:—Being thus bid by his god, the lord of demons fell into a profound meditation, with his nostrils snoring loudly like the gurgling waters of the deep.
5. As the lord Vishnu departed from his sight, the chief of the demons made his oblations after him; consisting of handfuls of flowers and rich gems and jewels of various kinds.
6. Then seated in his posture of padmásana, with his legs folded over one another, upon his elevated and elegant seat; and then chaunted his holy hymn and reflected within himself.
7. My deliverer from this sinful world, has bade me to have my discrimination, therefore must I betake myself to discriminate between what is true and falsehood.
8. I must know that I am in this darksome world, and must seek the light of my soul as also what is that principle (Ego), that makes me speak, walk and take the pains to earn myself.
9. I perceive it is nothing of this external world, like any of its verdant trees or hills; the external bodies are all of a gross nature, but my ego is quite a simple and pure essence.
10. I am not this insensible body, which is both dull and dumb, and is made to move for a moment by means of the vital airs. It is an unreal appearance of a transitory existence.
11. I am not the insensible sound, which is a vacuous substance and produced in vacuity. It is perceptible by the ear-hole, and is as evanescent and inane as empty air.
12. I am neither the insensible organ of touch, or the momentary feeling of taction; but find myself to be an inward principle with the faculty of intellection, and the capacity of knowing the nature of the soul.
13. I am not even my taste, which is confined to the relishing of certain objects, and to the organ of the tongue; which is a trifling and ever restless thing, sticking to and moving in the cavity of the mouth.
14. I am not my sight, that is employed in seeing the visibles only; it is weak and decaying and never lasting in its power, nor capable of viewing the invisible Spirit.
15. I am not the power of my smelling, which appertains to my nasal organ only, and is conversant with odorous substances for a short moment only. (Fragrance is a fleeting thing).
16. I am pure intelligence, and none of the sensations of my five external organs of sense; I am neither my mental faculty, which is ever frail and fruit; nor is there any thing belonging to me or participating of my true essence. I am the soul and an indivisible whole.
17. I am the ego or my intellect, without the objects of intellection (i.e. the thinking principle freed from its thoughts). My ego pervades internally and externally over all things, and manifests them to the view. I am the whole without its parts, pure without foulness and everlasting.
18. It is my intellection that manifests to me this pot and that painting, and brings all other objects to my knowledge by its pure light; as the sun and a lamp show everything to the sight.
19. Ah! I come to remember the whole truth at present, that I am the immutable and all pervading Spirit, shining in the form of the intellect (Gloss. The internal and intellectual Soul, is the Spirit of God).
20. This essence evolves itself into the various faculties of sense; as the inward fire unfolds itself into the forms of its flash and flame, and its sparks and visible light.
21. It is this principle which unfolds itself, into the forms of the different organs of sense also; as the all-diffusive heat of the hot season, shows itself in the shape of mirage in sandy deserts.
22. It is this element likewise which constitutes the substance of all objects; as it is the light of the lamp which is the cause of the various colours of things; as the whiteness or other of a piece of cloth or any other thing. (The intrinsic perceptivity of the soul, causes the extrinsic senses and their separate organs).
23. It is the source of the perception of all living and waking beings, and of everything else in existence; and as a mirror is the reflector of all outward appearances, so is the Soul the reflective organ of all its internal and external phenomena.
24. It is by means of this immutable intellectual light alone, that we perceive the heat of the sun, the coldness of the moon, solidity of the rock and the fluidity of water.
25. This one is the prime cause of every object of our continuous perceptions in this world; this is the first cause of all things, without having any prior cause of its own. (The soul produces the body, and not the body brings forth the soul).
26. It is this that produces our notions of the continuity of objects that are spread all around us, and take the name of objects from their objectivity of the soul; as a thing is called not from the heat which makes it such.
27. It is this formless cause, that is the prime cause of all plastic and secondary causes (such as Brahmá the creative agent and others). It is from this that the world has its production, as coldness is the produce of cold and the like.
28. The gods Brahmá, Vishnu, Rudra and Indra, who are causes of the existence of the world, all owe their origin to this prime cause, who has no cause of himself.
29. I hail that Supreme soul which is imprest in me, and is apart from every object of thought of the intellect, and which is self-manifest in all things and at all times.
30. All beings besides, stand in the relation of modes and modalities to this Supreme Being; and they immerge as properties in that intellectual Spirit.
31. Whatever this internal and intelligent Soul wills to do, the same is done every where; and nothing besides that self same soul exists in reality any where.
32. Whatever is intended to be done by this intellectual power, the same receives a form of its own; and whatever is thought to be undone by the intellect, the same is dissolved into nought from its substantiality.
33. These numberless series of worldly objects (as this pot, these paintings and the like), are as shades cast on the immense mirror of vacuum (or as air-drawn pictures represented on the canvas of empty Space).
34. All these objects increase and decrease in their figures under the light of the soul, like the shadows of things enlarging and diminishing themselves in the sun shine.
35. This internal Soul is invisible to all beings, except to those whose minds are melted down in piety. It is seen by the righteous in the form of the clear firmament.
36. This great cause like a large tree, gives rise to all these visible phenomena like its germ and sprouts; and the movements of living beings, are as the flitterings of bees about this tree.
37. It is this that gives rise to the whole creation both in its ideal and real and mobile or quiescent forms; as a huge rock gives growth to a large forest with its various kinds of big trees and dwarf shrubberies. (To him no high, no low, no great, no small, He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all. Pope).
38. It is not apart from anything, existing in the womb of this triple world; but is residing alike in the highest gods, as in the lowest grass below; and manifests them all full to our view.
39. This is one with the ego, and the all-pervading soul; and is situated as the moving spirit, and unmoving dullness of the whole.