Story of the miserly Kiráta.
Argument:—Perfection of Chúdálá and the imbecility of the Prince; efficacy of instruction and its elucidation in the tale of niggardly Kiráta.
VASISHTHA continued:—Thus the royal dame was possest of the qualities of contracting and expanding herself to any form, and became so expert in these by their continued practice of them;
2. That she made her aerial journey and navigated at pleasure over the expanse of waters; she moved on the surface of the earth, as the river Ganges glides on in her silent course.
3. She dwelt in the bosom of her lord, as the goddess of prosperity abides in the heart of Hari, and travelled in a moment with her mind over every city and country over the earth.
4. This fairy lady fled in the air, and flashed like the lightning with the flashes of her twinkling eyes; she passed as a shadow over the earth, as a body of clouds passes over a range of mountains.
5. She passed without any hazard through the grass and wood, stones and clods of earth, and through fire and water and air and vacuum, as a thread passes through hole of a heart. (Milton says:—That with no middle flight, to the heaven of heavens I have presented through an earthly quest).
6. She lightly skimmed over the mountain peaks, and pryed through the regions of the regents of all the sides of heaven; she penetrated into the cavities of the empty womb of vacuity, and have a pleasant trip whatever she directed in her flight. (All this is brain action and no reality at all).
7. She conversed freely with all living beings, whether they move or prone on the ground as the beast of earth, or crawl upon it as the snakes and insects. She talked with the savage Pisácha tribes and communicated with men and the immortal Gods and demi-gods also. (The clever princess like the far-seeing seer saw every thing with her mind's eye, and held her converse (vyavahára) with all).
8. She tried much to communicate her knowledge to her ignorant husband, but he was no way capable of receiving her spiritual instruction. (Átmajnána means also her intuitive or self taught knowledge).