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of all happiness. Morning and evening one should listen to the grave counsels of those that are aged. One attains to wisdom by |
constant waiting upon those that are venerable for years. While reading the Vedas or employed in eating, one should use one's |
right hand. One should always keep one's speech and mind under thorough control, as also one's senses. With well-cooked |
frumenty, Yavaka, Krisara, and Havi (clarified butter), one should worship the Pitris and the deities in the Sraddha called |
Ashtaka. The same should be used in worshipping the Planets. One should not undergo a shave without calling down a blessing |
upon oneself. If one sneezes, one should be blessed by those present. All that are ill or afflicted with disease, should be blessed. |
The extension of their lives should be prayed for.[624] One should never address an eminent person familiarly (by using the |
word Twam). Under even the great difficulties one should never do this. To address such a person as Twam and to slay him are |
equal, persons of learning are degraded by such a style of address. Unto those that are inferior, or equal, or unto disciples, such |
a word can be used. The heart of the sinful man always proclaims the sins he has committed. Those men who have deliberately |
committed sins meet with destruction by seeking to conceal them from the good. Indeed, they that are confirmed sinners seek |
to conceal their sinful acts from others.[625] Such persons think that their sins are witnessed by neither men nor the deities. |
The sinful man, overwhelmed by his sins, takes birth in a miserable order of being. The sins of such a man continually grow, |
even as the interest the usurer charge (on the loans he grants) increase from day to day. If, having committed a sin, one seeks to |
have it covered by righteousness, that sin becomes destroyed and leads to righteousness instead of other sins.[626] If a quantity |
of water be poured upon salt, the latter immediately dissolves away. Even so when expiation is performed, sin dissolves away. |
For these reasons one should never conceal a sin. Concealed, it is certain to increase. Having committed a sin, one should |
confess it in the presence of those that are good. They would destroy it immediately. If one does not enjoy in good time what |
one has stored with hope, the consequence is that the stored wealth finds another owner after the death of him who has stored |
it. The wise have said that the mind of every creature is the true test of Righteousness. Hence, all creatures in the world have an |
innate tendency to achieve Righteousness. One should achieve Righteousness alone or single-handed. Verily, one should not |
proclaim oneself Righteous and walk with the standard of Righteousness borne aloft for purpose of exhibition. They are said to |
be traders in Righteousness who practise it for enjoying the fruits it brings about. One should adore the deities without giving |
way to sentiments of pride. Similarly, one should serve one's preceptor without deceit. One should make arrangements for |
securing to oneself invaluable wealth in the hereafter which consists in gifts made here to deserving persons.'" |
SECTION CLXVIII |
"Yudhishthira said, 'It is seen that if a person happens to be unfortunate, he fails to acquire wealth, how great so ever his |
strength. On the other hand, if one happens to be fortunate, he comes to the possession of wealth, even if he be a weakling or a |
fool. When, again, the time does not come for acquisition, one cannot make an acquisition with even one's best exertion. When, |
however, the time comes for acquisition, one wins great wealth without any exertion. Hundreds of men may be seen who |
achieve no result even when they exert their best. Many persons, again, are seen to make acquisitions without any exertion. If, |
wealth were the result of exertion, then one could, with exertion, acquire it immediately. Verily, if the case were so, no man of |
learning could then be seen to take the protection for the sake of his livelihood, of one destitute of learning, Among men, that |
which is not (destined) to be attained, O chief of the Bharatas, is never attained. Men are seen to fail in achieving results even |
with the aid of their best exertions. One may be seen to seek wealth by hundreds of means (and yet failing to acquire it); while |
another, without at all seeking it, becomes happy in its possession. Men may be seen doing evil acts continually (for wealth) |
and yet failing to acquire it. Others are in the enjoyment of wealth without doing any evil act whatever. Others, again, who are |
observant of the duties assigned to them by the scriptures, are without wealth. One may be seen to be without any knowledge |
of the science of morals and policy even after one has studied all the treatises on that science. One, again, may be seen |
appointed as the prime minister of a king without having at all studied the science of morals and policy. A learned man may be |
seen that is possessed of wealth. One destitute of learning may be seen owning wealth. Both kinds of men, again, may be seen |
to be entirely destitute of wealth. If, by the acquisition of learning one could acquire the happiness of wealth, then no man of |
learning could be found living, for the very means of his subsistence, under the protection of one destitute of learning. Indeed, |
if one could obtain by the acquisition of learning, all desirable objects like a thirsty individual having his thirst slaked upon |
obtaining water, then none in this world would have shown idleness in acquiring learning. If, one's time has not come, one does |
not die even if one be pierced with hundreds of shafts. On the other hand, one lays down one's life, if one's hour has come, even |
if it be a blade of grass with which one is struck.' |
"Bhishma said, 'If one, setting oneself to undertaking involving even great exertions, fails to earn wealth, one should then |
practise severe austerities. Unless seeds be sown, no crops appear. It is by making gifts (to deserving persons in this life) that |
one acquires (in one's next life) numerous objects of enjoyment, even as one becomes possessed of intelligence and wisdom by |
waiting upon those that are venerable for years. The wise have said that one becomes possessed of longevity by practising the |
duty of abstention from cruelty to all creatures. Hence, one should make gifts and not solicit (or accept them when made by |
others). One should worship those individuals that are righteous. Verily, one should be sweet-speeched towards all, and always |
do what is agreeable to others. One should seek to attain to purity (both mental and external). Indeed, one should always |
abstain from doing injury to any creature. When in the matter of the happiness and woe of even insects and ants, their acts (of |
this and past lives) and Nature constitute the cause, it is meet, O Yudhishthira, that thou shouldst he tranquil!'"[627] |
SECTION CLXIV |
"Bhishma said, 'If one does acts oneself that are good or causes others to accomplish them, one should then expect to attain to |
the merits of righteousness. Similarly, if one does acts oneself that are evil, and causes others to accomplish them, one should |
never expect to attain to the merits of righteousness.[628] At all times, it is Time that, entering the understandings of all |
creatures, sets them to acts of righteousness or unrighteousness, and then confer felicity or misery upon them. When a person, |
beholding the fruits of Righteousness, understands Righteousness to be superior, it is then that he inclines towards |
Righteousness and puts faith in it. One, however, whose understanding is not firm, fails to put faith in it, As regards faith in |
Righteousness, it is this (and nothing else). To put faith in Righteousness is the indication of the wisdom of all persons. One |
that is acquainted with both (i.e., what should be done and what should not be done), with a view to opportuneness, should, |
with care and devotion, achieve what is right. Those Righteous men who have in this life been blessed with affluence, acting of |
their own motion, take particular care of their souls so that they may not, in their next lives, have to take birth as persons with |
the attribute of Passion predominating in them. Time (which is the supreme disposer of all things) can never make |
Righteousness the cause of misery. One should, therefore, know that the soul which is righteous is certainly pure (i.e., freed |
from the element of evil and misery). As regards Unrighteousness, it may be said that, even when of large proportions, it is |
incapable of even touching Righteousness which is always protected by Time and which shines like a blazing fire. These are |
the two results achieved by Righteousness, viz., the stainlessness of the soul and unsusceptibility of being touched by |
Unrighteousness. Verily, Righteousness is fraught with victory. Its effulgence is so great that it illumines the three worlds. A |
man of wisdom cannot catch hold of a sinful person and forcibly cause him to become righteous. When seriously urged to act |
righteously, the sinful only act with hypocrisy, impelled by fear. They that are righteous among the Sudras never betake |
themselves to such hypocrisy under the plea that persons of the Sudra order are not permitted to live according to any of the |
four prescribed modes. I shall tell thee particularly what the duties truly are of the four orders. So far as their bodies are |
concerned, the individuals belonging to all the four orders have the five primal elements for the constituent ingredients. Indeed, |
in this respect, they are all of the same substance. For all that, distinctions exist between them in respect of both practices |
relating to life or the world and the duties of righteousness. Notwithstanding these distinctions, sufficient liberty of action is |
left to them in consequence of which all individuals may attain to an equality of condition. The regions of felicity which |
represent the consequences or rewards of Righteousness are not eternal, for they are destined to come to an end. Righteousness, |
however, is eternal. When the cause is eternal, why is the effect not so?[629] The answer to this is as follows. Only that |
Righteousness is eternal which is not promoted by the desire of fruit or reward. (That Righteous, however, which is prompted |
by the desire of reward, not eternal. Hence, the reward though undesired that attaches to the first kind of Righteousness, viz., |
attainment of identity with Brahman, is eternal. The reward, however, that attaches to that Righteousness prompted by desire of |
fruit. Heaven is not eternal).[630] All men are equal in respect of their physical organism. All of them, again, are possessed of |
souls that are equal in respect of their nature. When dissolution comes, all else dissolve away. What remains is the inceptive |
will to achieve Righteousness. That, indeed, reappears (in next life) of itself.[631] When such is the result (that is, when the |
enjoyments and endurance of this life are due to the acts of a past life), the inequality of lot discernible among human beings |
cannot be regarded in any way anomalous. So also, it is seen that those creatures that belong to the intermediate orders of |
existence are equally subject, in the matter of their acts, to the influence of example.'" |
SECTION CLXV |
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