2. Vasishtha answered:—Tell me, Ráma, what is the form of the barren woman’s son, and wherefrom he comes and where he goes, tell me also from where comes the sky-arbour (aerial castle), and where it remains.
3. Ráma replied:—There never was, nor is, nor ever will be the son of a barren woman or an arbour in the sky; why then ask about the form and figure of what is nothing?
4. Vasishtha said:—As there never was a barren woman’s son or a forest in the air, so there existed no such scene as that of the world before.
5. That which has no existence at all, could have neither its production before, nor can it have its dissolution afterwards. What shall I then tell you regarding its genesis or exit.
6. Ráma rejoined:—The son of a barren woman and a forest in the sky are mere fictions, but the visible world is not so, which has both its beginning and end.
7. Vasishtha replied:—It is hard to have a comparison of the compared object, agreeing in all respects with what it is compared. The comparison of the world, is as a simile of those objects, which admit of no comparison (but with themselves).
8. The appearance of the world, is compared with that of a bracelet, because the one is as false as the other, and neither of them is real.
9. And as there is nothing in the sky except a negative emptiness, so the existence of the world in Brahma, is but a negative idea.
10. As the collyrium is no other than blackness, and as there is no difference between frost and its coldness, so the world is not otherwise than the great Brahma himself.
11. As coldness can not be negatived of the moon and frost, so creation can not be negated of God. (Literally, creation is no negative property of Brahma, but essential to his nature).