39. The wise minister is the prince’s guide to justice, and it is he who elevates both the prince and his people. Justice is the first of the four cardinal virtues (justice, temperance, prudence and frugality), and it is the only virtue of a ruler; who is thence called the _Dharma avatára_ or personification of justice. 40. But kings must have spiritual knowledge also, because it is the highest of human knowledge. The king having this knowledge, becomes the best of kings; and the minister who knows the soul, can give the best counsel for the guidance of other souls. (For it is said:—Nándhenaiva níyamána yathándhah; the blind cannot lead the blind. So the Gospel: one blind man cannot lead another). 41. It is the fellow feeling for others that makes a ruler, whoever is unacquainted with this rule, is not fit to be either a ruler or his minister. (The rule is: Rule others as ye rule yourselves. _Sadhi swátmá vadanyán_). 42. If ye know this polity, it is good and ye shall prosper, or else ye wrong yourselves and your subjects; in which case ye must be made a prey to me. (Because if you have no regard for your own souls and those of others, why should I have any regard for yours?) 43. There is but one expedient for you two lads, to escape from my clutches; and it is by your solution of my intricate questions; according to your best wits and judgment. (The queries are said to be _prasna pinjara_ or the cage or prison-house of dilemmas; in which sense the text should read _vidárayasi_ for _vichárayasi_, to mean that, if you cannot break the knots, I will not stop to break your necks). 44. Now do you, O prince and you his counsellor, give me the solution of the questions that I require of you. If you fail to give the proper answers as you have agreed to do, you must then fall under my hands, as any body that fails to keep his words. (The breach of a promise was punishable with death by the old Hindu law. Hence the first question; “Why am I obliged in keeping my word” in Paley’s Moral philosophy). CHAPTER LXXIX. INTERROGATORIES OF THE ‘RÁKSHASÍ’. Argument. Seventy questions of Karkatí, which are hard for the unlearned but too plain to the wise. They are intricate for their riddling nature to boys, but plain by their double sense to the learned. Vasishtha continued:—After saying so, the fiend began to put forth her queries; and you should be attentive to them Ráma, like the prince who told her to go on. 2. The Rákshasí resumed:—What is that atomic minim which is one yet many, and as vast as the ocean, and which contains innumerable worlds like the bubbles of the sea? (It is a minim for its minuteness, an atom—owing to its imperceptibility, one—as regards its unity, many—on account of its attributes (upádhis), and vast in respect to its infinity, containing the passing worlds as the evanescent bubbles of water).