[CHAPTER VII.]
Argument:—The effects of ignorance, shown in the evils brought on by our vain desires and fallacies or erroneous judgments.
VASISISHTA continued. These beauties that are so decorated with precious gems and jewels, and embellished with the strings of brilliant pearls, are as the playful billows in the milky ocean of the moon-beams of our fond desires.
2. The sidelong looks of the beautiful eyes in their faces, look like a cluster of black bees, sitting on the pericarp of a full blown lotus.
3. These beauties appear as charming, to the enslaved minds of deluded men; and as the vernal flowers which are strewn upon the ground in forest lands.
4. Their comely persons which are compared with the moon, the lotus flower, and sandal paste for their coolness by fascinated minds; are viewed as indifferently by the wise, as by the insensible beasts which make a prey of them. (Lit. by the rapacious wolves and dogs and vultures which devour them).
5. Their swollen breasts which are compared with lotus-buds, ripe pomegranates and cups of gold, are viewed by the wise as a lump of flesh and blood and nauseous liquor.
6. Their fleshy lips, distilling the impure saliva and spittle, are said to exude with ambrosial honey, and to bear resemblance with the ruby and coral and vimba fruits.