Bhása said:—Hear now, O lord of the earth, what I then said to the god of fire, from my seat under the wing of his riding parrot, and the answer which the god made to my query.
2. I said, O lord, of the sacrificial fire and sacrifice, deign to explain unto me the mystery of the carcass, and the accompanying events (of the goddess and her demons).
3. The god <of> fire replied:—Attend, O prince, and I will tell you all of what has happened; and relate to you all about the carcass, as it is well known in all the three worlds (i.e. in the traditions of all people).
4. Know there is an eternal formless and transcendent Intellect, in the form of the boundless and formless vacuity; wherein there are countless worlds, subsisting as minute atoms in endless space.
5. This intellectual void, which contains all and every thing in itself; happened of its own spontaneity, to be conscious of its contents in course of time.
6. I conceived by its innate knowledge, the abstract idea of igneous particles of in itself, just as you find yourself to be in the state of travelling in your dream; by thinking yourself as such in the state of your waking. (One dreams whatever he thinks in himself).
7. It was thus that the Divine Intellect saw the particles of fire, as in the unconscious state of its dream; and as one sees the lotus dust (for any thing,) before him in his imagination.
8. Then as this Intellect reflected on the expansion of these particles, it became itself assimilated with them; and evolved itself in the thought in the shape of powers and organs of sense, in those particles of its body.
9. It then beheld the sensible organs, as receptacles of their particular faculties; and saw the world with all its beings, appearing before it as in its dream; and as we see a city in our dreaming state.
10. There was one among the living by name of Asura, who became haughty and proud of his dignity, he was vain and addicted to vanities, and had no parents nor forefathers of his own.