117. Those who are tempted to taste the gall of worldly pleasures for sweet, are so subdued by its effects on their understandings, that they lose the power of discerning the truth altogether; and it is therefore useless to remonstrate with them. CHAPTER XIV. ASCERTAINMENT OF THE THINKING PRINCIPLE. Argument. People unworthy of persuasion, their transmigrations, and purification of the mind. Vasishtha said: These multitudes of men, that are carried away by the waves of the torrents of the sea of worldly pursuits; are deaf and dumb to the admonitions of their spiritual instructors. 2. They are not fit to derive the benefit of the spiritual knowledge, which I have propounded in this yogasástra by my rational discourses. 3. They who are born blind and can see nothing, are not to be presented with the picture of a garden, portrayed with blooming blossoms and beautiful flowers by the intelligent artist. 4. There is no such fool that would present fragrant odours to one, whose nostrils are snorting under some nasal disease (pinasa. Polypus), nor so great a dolt, that would consult an ignorant man on spiritual matters. 5. What lack-wit is there, that would refer a question on law or religious subjects, to one of ungoverned passions and organs of sense, or whose eyeballs are rolling with the intoxication of wine. 6. Who asks of the dead the way he should go, or one in the grave about the concourse in the city; and what witless man is there that resorts to an idiot to clear his doubts. 7. Of what good is it to advise a witling, whose serpentine mind is coiling and creeping in the cave of his heart; and though it lies there in silence and sightless, is yet ungovernably wild? 8. Know there is no such a thing as a well governed mind, for though you may fling it at a distance from you, yet it is never lost or annihilated. (The unsubdued mind recurs to us in repeated births). 9. The simpleton who does not bear his sway over his false and delusive mind, is tormented to death by its venomous smart, as if stung by a deadly reptile. 10. The learned know the vital powers, and the operations of the organs of action, to depend on the action and force of the soul; say then, O Ráma, what is that thing which they call the mind. (The three functions of motion, thought and organic action, being conducted by force of the vital breath, it is in vain to suppose the existence of the mind). 11. The vital breath gives the force for bodily actions, and the soul produces the power of knowledge; the organs act by their own force, and the supreme spirit is the main source of all. 12. All forces are but parts of the omnipotence of the supreme Spirit; their different appellations are but inventions of men. 13. What is it that they call the living soul, and which has blindfolded the world; and what they term as the mind, is really an unreality and without any power of its own.