CHAPTER LXXI.
A Discourse on the Body, Mind and Soul.
Argument. Consideration of the Soul in its Various lights, and its Irrelation with the body.
Vasishtha continued:—The consideration of the fourth stage, is attended with the knowledge of monoity or oneness of all; and this is the province of the living liberated man according to the dicta of the veda. (Consideration or parámarsha is defined as a logical antecedent or knowledge of a general principle, combined with the knowledge that the case in question is one to which it is applicable; as the smoke of the hill is attended by fire, is a logical antecedent. In plain words it means, that the Turíya yoga, presupposes the knowledge of unity or onliness of the one self-existent Kaivalya or monism).
2. Rising above this to the turyality or hyperquartan state, in which one sees nothing but an inane vacuity. This is the state of disembodied spirits, that are lost in infinity, and of whom the sástras can say nothing. (i.e. The embodied or living soul has knowledge of its personality, up to the fourth stage of its elevation; but the disembodied or departed soul, that is liberated after death, and becomes (Videha mukta), grows as impersonal as the undistinguishable vacuum).
3. This state of quiet rest, lies afar from the farthest object; and is attained by those who are liberated of their bodies; just as the aerial path is found only by aerial beings. (The spheres of spirits are unknown to embodied beings).
4. After a man has forgotten the existence of the world, for sometime in his state of sound sleep; he gains the fourth state of turíya, which is full of felicity and rapture.
5. The manner in which the spiritualists have come to know the superquartan state, should also be followed by you, O Ráma, in order to understand that unparalleled state of felicity which attends upon it.
6. Remain, O Ráma, in your state of hypnotism—Susupta, and continue in your course of worldly duties even in that state; so as your mind like the moon in painting may not be subject to its waning phases, nor be seized by any alarm (like the threatening eclipses of the moon).
7. Do not think that the waste or stability of your body, can affect the state of your intellect; because the body bears no relation with the mind, and is but an erroneous conception of the brain.
8. Although the body is nothing, yet it must not be destroyed by any means; because you gain nothing by destroying it, nor lose anything by its firmness; but remain in the continuance of your duties, and leave the body to go on in its own wonted course.