CHAPTER LVI. Investigation into Meditation and Contemplation.
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Valmiki and Mitra, Viharilala
40. The soul which is conscious of its innate images, sees the same in their intellectual appearances within the mind, and in their external manifestations in the visible creation.
41. He who has his internal and external tranquility, and enjoys his peace of mind, and views the world inseparable from the soul, enjoys his quiet samádhi everywhere; but he who perceives their difference, and differentiates his egoism from all others (that is, who sees his distinction from other beings), he is ever subject to be tossed about, as by the rolling waves of the sea.
42. The soul that is infested by the maladies of this world, sees the earth, sky, air and water, together with the hills and all things in them, burning before it as in the conflagration, of the last day of dissolution (pralaya).
43. He who performs his work with his organs of action, and has his soul fixed in its internal meditation; and is not moved by any joy or grief, is called the dispassionate yogi.
44. He who beholds the all pervading soul in his own self, and by remaining unruffled in his mind, doth never grieve at nor thinks about any thing; is styled the unimpassioned yogi.
45. Who looks calmly into the course of the world, as it has passed or is present before him, and sits still smiling at its vicissitudes, that man is named the unpassionate yogi.
46. Because these changing phenomena do not appertain to unchanging spirit of God, nor do they participate with my own egoism (i.e. they are no parts, of God or myself); they but resemble the glittering atoms of gold in the bright sun-shine which do not exist in the sky.
47. He who has no sense of egoism or tuism in himself, nor the distinction of things in his mind, as of the sensible and insensible ones; is the one that truly exists, and not the other who thinks otherwise. (So says the Sruti:—The one alike in all is the All, and not the other, who is unlike every thing).
48. He who conducts all his affairs with ease, by his remaining as the intangible and translucent air about him, and who remains as insensible of his joy and sorrow, as a block of wood or stone, is the man that is called the sedate and quiet.
49. He who of his own nature and not through fear, looks on all beings as himself, and accounts the goods of others as worthless stones; is the man that sees them in their true light.
50. No object whether great or small, is slighted as a trifle by the polished or foolish; they value all things, but do not perceive in their hearts, the Reality that abides in them like the wise. (Fools look into the forms of things, but the wise look in their in being).
51. One possessed of such indifference and equality of his mind, attains to his highest perfection; and is quite unconcerned with regard to his rise and fall, and about his life and death.
52. He is quite unconcerned with any thing, whether he is situated amidst the luxuries at his home, and the superfluities of the world, or when he is bereft of all his possessions and enjoyments, and is exposed in a dreary and deep solitude:
53. Whether indulging in voluptuousness or bacchanal revelry, or remaining retired from society and observing his taciturnity (it is all equal to him, if he is but indifferent about them).
54. Whether he anoints his body with sandal paste or agalo chum, or besmears it with powdered camphor; or whether he rubs his person with ashes, or casts himself into the flames (it is all the same to him, with his non-chalance of them).
55. Whether drowned in sinfulness, or marked by his meritoriousness; whether he dies this day or lives for a kalpa-age (it is all the same to the indifferent).
56. The man of indifference is nothing in himself, and therefore his doings are no acts of his own. He is not polluted by impurity, as the pure gold is not sullied by dirt or dust.
57. It is the wrong application of the words consciousness—samvit, and soul (purusha), to I and thou (or the subjective and objective), which has led the ignorant to the blunder (of duality), as the silvery shell of cockles, misleads men to the error of silver.
58. The knowledge of the extinction of all existence (in the Supreme Spirit), is the only cure for this blunder of one’s entity, and the only means to the peace of his mind.
59. The error of egoism and tuism of the conscious soul, which is the source of its vain desires, causes the variety of the weal and woe of mankind in their repeated births. (Selfishness grows our desires, and these again produce our woes).
60. As the removal of the fallacy of the snake in the rope, gives peace to the mind of there being no snake therein; so the subsidence of egoism in the soul, brings peace and tranquility to the mind.
61. He that is conscious of his inward soul, and unconscious of all he does, eats, drinks; and of his going to others, and offering his sacrifice; is free from the results of his acts: and it is the same to him, whether he does them or not.
62. He who slides from outward nature, and abides in his inward soul; is released from all external actions, and the good and evil resulting therefrom.
63. No wish stirs in such unruffled soul, in the same manner as no germ sprouts forth from the bosom of a stone; and such desires as ever rise in it, are as the waves of the sea, rising and falling in the same element.
64. All this is Himself, and He is the whole of this universe, without any partition or duality in Him. He is one with the holy and Supreme soul, and the only entity called the Idest, tatsat. (He is no unreality, but as real as the true Reality).