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READING THE SIXTEENTH.

THE HOLY ONE spoke.

Fearlessness, purity of heart, continuance in the devotion of knowledge, almsgiving, self-restraint and sacrifice, solitary reading (a), penance, uprightness;

Innocence, truth, freedom from anger, renunciation, tranquillity, good will, compassion for all, absence of desire or emotion,2 gentleness, modesty, gravity;

Vigour, patience, firmness, chastity, absence of vindictiveness and of vanity,-these are the conditions, O son of Bharata! of a man who is born for a divine (b) lot.3

Deceit, pride, and self-conceit, wrath, rudeness, and ignorance, are the conditions of him, O son of Pritha! who is born for the lot of the Asuras.

The divine lot is deemed to be for deliverance (from matter), that of the Asuras for bondage. Grieve not, O son of Bharata! thou wast born for a divine lot.

1 Apaisunam, not playing the spy, from pisuna, a spy; not prying into the faults of others. It may be translated "kindliness."

2 Alolatuam, absence of desire, according to Śrīdhara, as of praise (?) (varna) or children. Śankara says that it means an unaffected state of the senses when brought into contact with the objects of sense. Lola means tremulous, emotional, desirous, and alolatwam denotes a passive, unruffled state of mind. Varna generally means colour or caste, but

sometimes praise (lob, preis, Peters. Dict.)

3 This refers to the doctrine of metempsychosis, or the migration of the soul to other bodies, so often alluded to in the Bhagavad Gitā. The good go after death to one of the heavens of the gods, the bad to the abode of Asuras (demons) or to vile forms of life.

4 Freedom from all connection with matter or material forms in nirvana. An Asura lot is the re

verse.

There are two kinds of creatures in this world-one divine, the other that of the Asuras. The divine has been described at large; hear now from Me, O son of Pritha! the Asura kind.

The men who are like Asuras know neither creation (c) (pravritti) nor its end (by return to Brahma): no purity or good conduct or truth is found in them.

"The universe," say they, "has in it neither truth, nor order, nor a ruler (d),1 is not produced by a succession (of causes) (e), and is only designed for lusts."

Fixed in this view, these ruined souls, small in intellect and cruel in deeds, prevail as foes for the ruin of the world. 10 Giving themselves up to insatiable lusts, full of deceit, vanity, and folly, they hold false notions through delusion, and in their lives are devoted to impurity.

They cherish immoderate thoughts, ending in death (ƒ), accounting the enjoyment of their lusts the chief (good), persuaded that “that is all.”

Bound by a hundred bands of hope, devoted to lust and wrath, they strive to gain hoards of wealth by unjust means for the enjoyment of their lusts.

"This," say they, "I have gained to-day: that desire of my heart I shall obtain. This possession is now mine, and that also shall be mine hereafter.

1 Men who are atheists, or at least practically deny a divine origin or superintendence of the world. Atheists of a coarse, sensuous type seem to be chiefly assailed; for Kapila certainly did not admit a personal deity into his system, and yet he is spoken of in the Bhagavad Gita with respect. Materialists like the Charvākas, who admitted only

one source of knowledge, our senseperceptions, and therefore refused to admit the truth or reality of any person or thing that is not cognisable by the senses, are here denounced. The author of the Bhagavad Gitā strenuously maintains the existence of an Eternal Supreme Spirit, whom the senses cannot discern.

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"This foe has been slain by me, and I shall slay the others also. I am a lord: I enjoy delights: I am successful, powerful, happy.

“I am rich, I am of noble birth: what other man is like to me? I will sacrifice and give largesse. I will be merry." Thus (they speak), deluded by ignor

ance.

Tossed to and fro by many thoughts, enveloped in the meshes of delusion, devoted to the enjoyment of their lust, they fall down to the foul Naraka (hell).

Self-conceited, stubborn, filled with the pride and the intoxication of wealth, they offer with hypocrisy (9) vain sacrifices (lit. name-sacrifices), which are not according to ancient rule.

Devoted to egotism, violence, pride, lust, and wrath, these revilers are adverse to me in their own bodies and in (those of) others;

These men, haters (of Me), cruel, the vilest of mankind, these unholy men I cast down perpetually into the wombs of Asuras.

Having reached an Asura-womb, befooled from birth to birth, they never attain to Me, O son of Kunti! and thus they go down the lowest way.

This threefold gate of hell-lust, wrath, and avarice -is the ruin of the soul; wherefore let every man renounce these three.

A man who has become free from these three gates of darkness (h), O son of Kunti! works out the salvation of his soul, and thus he goes to the highest way.

[He who has abandoned the ordinances of sacred

1 By the possession of children, cattle, &c., according to Ananda.

The word (siddha) means here, I think, "perfectly successful."

books,1 and acts only as he lusts, attains not to perfection, happiness, or the highest way.2

Wherefore let the sacred books be thy rule in determining what is to be done or left undone. When thou hast learned what is the work enjoined by the rules of holy books, so oughtest thou to act.]

1 Books of devotion or religious teaching, of whatever kind.

2 By perfection is meant the highest earthly state, which Kapila asserted to be a state of perfect knowledge, i.e., of the true nature of soul and matter; and Patanjali, the founder of the Yoga system, to be a state of mystic union with the

divine nature through constant meditation. Blessedness is the heaven of one of the gods, as Indra. The highest way or goal is nirvāṇa. Śrīdhara glosses them as "the knowledge of truth, repose, and (final) deliverance." These two distichs are, I think, doubtful.

Thus the Bhagavad Gitā, Reading the Sixteenth, whose title is,

"DEVOTION (MEDITATION) WITH REGARD TO THE

SEPARATE STATE OF GODS AND ASURAS."

PHILOLOGICAL NOTES.

(a) Swādhyāya. "Pia meditatio" (Lassen); "study" (Thomson). It means reading to ones' self in a low tone the sacred books, especially the Vedas.

(b) Sampadam daivīm. "Qui divina sorte nascitur" (Lassen); "Né dans une condition divine" (Burnouf); "Born to heavenly endowments" (Telang). Sampad means state or condition, whether good or bad. A divine lot, according to Ananda, is "a fearless, true, and pure state."

(c) Pravrittim cha nivṛittim. These words are often employed to denote the development of created things and their ceasing to be on returning to Brahma at the end of a kalpa. Cf. c. xviii. 46, yataḥ pravṛittir bhūtānām, “From whom is the creation (flowing forth) of things." Burnouf's translation is, "L'emanation et le retour." But Sankara, Sridhara, and all the translators except Burnouf, interpret the words as meaning "action" and "inaction."

(d) Asatyam apratishṭham, anīśwaram. The Hindu scholiasts expla n the first term (untrue, unreal) to mean that there is nothing to be accepted as true, such as Vedas, Purāņas, &c. "They deny the truth of the creation and preservation of the world as taught by the Vedas or the schools of philosophy" (Thomson). Perhaps we may rather say that they do not believe that the world is a real creation, but only a fortuitous concourse of atoms.

Apratishtham. They deny that it is "really constituted" (Thomson). The Hindu scholiasts explain the word to mean that they affirm the non-existence of any fixed principle, based on virtue or vice, according to which the world is governed. This seems to be the true meaning. They deny that there is any moral government of the world, and therefore that it has a Supreme Lord.