3. Hear me tell you Ráma of another view of things, whereby the great sage Vítahavya gave up the practice of making his offerings to fire, and remained dauntless in his spiritualistic faith.
4. The illustrious Vítahavya wandered about the forests in former times, and then resided in a cave of the Vindhya mount, which was as spacious as a cave of Meru under the sun’s passage. (The cave of mount Meru is the Polar circle about which the sun is said to turn; but Sumeru is the meridian circle on which the sun passes).
5. He grew in course of time dissatisfied with the ritual acts, which serve only to bewilder men, and are causes of diseases and difficulties to man (rather than those of their removal).
6. He fixed his aim to the highest object of unalterable ecstasis—samádhi, and abandoned his cares for the rotten world, in the course of his conduct in life.
7. He built a hut of leaves with the branches of plantain trees; strewed it with black stones, and perfumed it with fragrant earth.
8. He spread in it his seat of deer’s skin, serving as a pure paillasse for holy saints; and sat still upon it as a rainless cloud in the clear firmament.
9. He sat there in the posture of padmásana with his legs crossed upon one another, and held his heels with the fingers of both his hands, and remained with his uplifted head, like the fast and fixed peak of a mountain summit.
10. He closed his eyesight from looking upon the surrounding objects, and pent up his mind in his bosom, as the descending sun confines his beams in the hollow caves of Meru.
11. Then having stopped the course of his internal and external senses, he thus revolved in his mind, which was free from sin and guile.
12. How is it that though I have restrained my outer organs, I cannot with all my force stop the course of my mind, which is ever as fickle as a leaflet, floating on and dancing over the waves.