Argument:—The inward composure of the enlightened soul and its view of the outer World.
Vasishtha continued:—The man whose reliance in this world is really lessened, who is free from desire and unobservant of his religious vows (for the sake of future reward), knowing them to be all in vain (i.e. the vanity of human wishes).
2. Our egoism is as the vapour of our breath, falling and sticking on the surface of glass; which when taken under consideration, proves to be a causeless sight, and vanishes to nothing at all in a moment.
3. He who is unloosed from the veil of delusion, who has numbed his rising wishes and efforts; whose soul is filled with heavenly ambrosia (i.e. full of holy delight), it is he who is said to be happy in his very nature and essence. (Blest is the enlightened and contented soul).
4. The enlightened mind, that is unshrouded from the mist of doubts or scepticism; bears resemblance with the full-moon, by illuming the sphere of its circle, with the splendour of its intelligence.
5. The intelligent man who is freed from his worldliness and doubts, who has come out of the curtain of ignorance and received the light of truth; is known as the knowing soul, shining in the sphere of the autumnal sky. (So the sruti: the knower of the soul, is as luminous as the very soul).
6. The holy man likens the pure breeze of heaven, that blows freely from the region of Brahma, without any aim and without its support; it is cool in itself and cooling and purifying every thing by its touch.
7. The desire to have an unreality, is to expect something that is a nullity in nature; such as the dreaming of heaven, and seeking for the son of a barren woman. (The belief in a future heaven, which is countenanced in every scheme of religion, is negatived by Vasishtha).
8. So also is the belief of this imaginary world, which appears as something in existence; such is the nature of our desire also, which attributes a substantiality to an aerial nothing.
9. Thus the world being an unreality even at present, there can be no reality in a heaven or hell in future; and yet the use of these words is as false, as the negative expression of a barren woman’s son, or a flower of the etherial arbour.