13. It is all of a piece without any joining of parts in it, and is as dense and compact as the hard adamant; it is thick, big and bulky in its size, but at the same time as clear and far as the face of the sky.
14. It continues from countless times, and endures to endless duration; and with its comely and pellucid body, it appears as the clear firmament, or the blank vacuum on high.
15. No one ever knows its nature or genus, from his having never seen anything of the same kind, nor does any body know from when and where, it hath come to existence. (All know it is, but none knows how and whence it is).
16. It does not contain anything substantial, as the material elements within itself; and yet it is as dense and solidified in itself as a crystalline, and indissoluble as an adamant.
17. Yet it is composed of innumerable streaks and strokes, which are embodied in itself; and these resemble the veins and fibres on lotus leaves, and the marks of conches etc. in Hari’s feet.
18. These marks are named as air, water, earth, fire and vacuum, though there are no such things to be found therein; except that the stone was possest living soul, which it imparted to its marks.
19. Ráma rejoined:—Tell me sir, how that stone of yours, could have life or sensibility in it; the stone is an insensible thing, and could not give names to the marks on its body.
20. Vasishtha replied:—That immense and luminous stone, is neither a sentient nor inert body; no body knows its nature and state, and there is no other like it.
21. Ráma said:—Tell me sir, who ever saw those marks, which are imprinted in the bosom of that stone; and how could any one ever break that stone, in order to see its contents and its marks.
22. Vasishtha replied:—It is hard to break this hard stone, nor has anybody been ever able to break it; by cause of its extending over infinite space, and encompassing all bodies within its bosom. (So says the sruti:—There is nothing but is encompassed by it—the all pervading soul).