13. He surpassed the lord of the Guhyakas—Kuvera, in the extent of his kingdom, his dignity and riches; he was greater than the guru of the lord of gods in his wisdom, and excelled the preceptor of the Asuras in learning.
14. He discharged his kingly duties, by giving rewards and punishments of the deserts of his men as they appeared to him; and was as firm in the acquittal of these duties, as the sun in making the day and his daily course.
15. He considered in himself the pain and pleasure, that his punishments and rewards caused his people; and to which they were like birds caught in nets from their freedom of flight.
16. “Why do I perforce pierce the hearts of my people,” he said, as they bruise the sesamum seeds for oil; it is plain that all persons are susceptible of pain and affliction like myself?
17. Yes, they are all capable of pain, and therefore I will cease to inflict them any more; but give them riches and please all persons.
18. But if I refrain to punish the tormentors of the good, they are sure to be extirpated by the wicked, as the bed of the channel is dried up for want of rain.
19. Oh! the painful dilemma in which I am placed, wherein my punishment and mercy to men are both grievous to me, or pleasing and unpleasing to me by turns.
20. Being in this manner much troubled in his mind, his thoughts disturbed his spirit like the waters in the whirlpools.
21. It happened at one time the sage Mándavya met him at his house, as the divine sage Nárada (the Mercury or messenger of gods), meets Indra in his celestial abode, in his journey through the regions of the sky.
22. The king honoured him with reverence, and then asked that great sage to remove his doubt, as they cut down a poisonous tree in the garden, with the stroke of the axe at its roots.