36. I am not content, O Bráhman! with these unmanageable enjoyments which are as flickering as the wings of bees, and are as soon at an end as they are born (like the ephemerids of a day). I long only for the state of supreme bliss, from my fear of repeated-births (transmigration), decay and death. CHAPTER XXII. OBLOQUY OF OLD AGE. Boyhood has scarcely lost its boyishness when it is overtaken by youth, which is soon followed by a ruthless old age, devouring the other two. 2. Old age withers the body like a frost freezing the lake of lilies. It drives away the beauty of the person as a storm does the autumnal clouds; and it pulls down the body, as a current carries away a tree on the bank. 3. The old man with his limbs slackened and worn out by age, and his body weakened by infirmity, is treated by women as a useless beast. 4. Old age drives a man’s good sense, as a good wife is driven away by her step dame. 5. A man in his state of tottering old age, is scoffed at as a dotard by his own sons and servants, and even by his wife, and all his friends and relations. 6. Insatiable avarice like a greedy vulture alights on the heads of the aged, when their appearance grows uncouth, and their bodies become helpless, and devoid of all manly qualities and powers. 7. Appetite the constant companion of my youth, is thriving along with my age, accompanied with her evils of indigence, and heart-burning cares and restlessness. 8. Ah me! what must I do to remove my present and future pains? It is this fear which increases with old age, and finds no remedy. 9. What am I that am brought to this extremity of senselessness, what can I do in this state. I must remain dumb and silent. Under these reflections there is an increased sense of helplessness in old age. 10. How and when and what shall I eat, and what is sweet to taste? These are the thoughts which trouble the mind of one when old age comes upon him. 11. There is an insatiable desire for enjoyments, but the powers to enjoy them are lacking. It is the want of strength which afflicts the heart in old age. 12. Hoary old age sits and shrieks as a heron on the top of the tree of this body, which is infested within it by the serpents of sickness. 13. As the grave owl—the bird of night, appears unexpectedly to our sight soon as the evening shades cover the landscape, so does the solemn appearance of death overtake us in the eve of our life. 14. As darkness prevails over the world at the eve of the day, so doth death overtake the body at the eve of the life. 15. Death overtakes a man in his hoary old age, just as an ape alights on a tree covered with pearly flowers. 16. Even a deserted city, a leafless tree and parched up land may present a fair aspect, but never does the body look well that is pulled down by hoary age.