47. All those various luxuries and superfluities of the world, are no way conducive to our real happiness; in as much as they mislead the mind to error, and corrupt the souls of even the wisest of men.
48. “Therefore, O father, show me that state of imperishable felicity, whereby I may attain to my everlasting repose and tranquility”.
49. My father having heard these words of mine, as he was then sitting under the shade of the kalpa tree of paradise, whose flowers were fairer far than the bright beams of the nocturnal luminary, and overspread the ground all around; spoke to me in his sweet mellifluous accents the following speech, for the purpose of removing my error.
CHAPTER XXIII.
SPEECH OF VIROCHANA ON SUBJECTION OF THE MIND.
Argument. The soul and mind personified as a monarch and his minister.
Virochana said:—There is an extensive country, my son, somewhere in this universe, with a spacious concavity therein, whose ample space is able to hold thousands of worlds and many more spheres in it.
2. It is devoid of the wide oceans and seas and high mountains, as there are in this earth; and there are not such forests, rivers and lakes, nor holy places of pilgrimage, as you see here below.
3. There is neither land nor sky, nor the heavenly orbs as on high; nor are there these suns and moons, nor the regents of the spheres, nor their inhabitants of gods and demons.
4. There are no races of Yakshas and Rakshas, nor those tribes of plants and trees, woods or grass; nor the moving and immovable beings, as you see upon the earth.
5. There is no water, no land, no fire nor air; nor are there the sides of the compass, nor the regions you call above and below. There is no light nor shadow, nor the peoples, nor the gods Hari, Indra and Siva, nor any of the inferior deities or demigods there.