52. I remember after the lapse of a thousand cycles of the four Yuga ages, that Brahmá created from his mind some aerial beings of unearthly forms; and these spiritual beings occupied a space extending over ten cycles of creations. 53. I remember likewise the varying positions and boundaries of countries, and also the very changing and diversified actions and occupations of their people. I remember too the various costumes and fashions and amusements of men, during the ceaseless course of days and nights in the endless duration of time. CHAPTER XXIII. DESIRE OF TRANQUILLITY AND QUIESCENCE OF THE MIND. Argument.--Relation of the vices and virtues which hasten and prevent death, and the peace and rest of the mind which is sought after by mankind. Vasishtha rejoined:--I then besought the chief of the crows, that was stationed on one end of a branch of the _kalpa_ tree, to tell me how he was not liable to fall into the hands of death, when all other animals moving about the expanse of the world, are doomed to be crushed under its all devouring jaws. 2. Bhusunda replied, You sir, that know all things and would yet ask me to tell that you know full well. Such bidding of my master emboldens your servant to speak out where he should otherwise hold his tongue. 3. Yet when you desire me to tell, I must do it as well as I can, because it is deemed to be the duty of a dependant, to carry out the commands of their kind masters. 4. Death will not demolish the man, who does not wear on his bosom the pearl-necklace of his vicious desires; as a robber does not kill a traveller that has not the pernicious chain of gold hanging on his breast. 5. Death will not destroy the man whose heart is not broken down by sorrows, whose breast is not sawed as a timber by the friction of his sighs, and whose body is not worsted by toil like a tree by canker worms. 6. Death will not overtake the man, whose body is not beset by cares like a tree by poisonous snakes, lifting their hoods above its head; and whose heart is not burnt by its anxieties, like a wood by its enraging fire. 7. Death will not prey upon the person, which is not vitiated by the poison of anger and enmity, and cavity of whose heart does not foster the dragon of avarice in its darkness, and whose heart is not corroded by the canker of cares. 8. He is not carried away by the cruel hand of death, whose body is not already fried by the fire of his resentment, which like hidden heat of the submarine fire, sucks up the waters of reason in the reservoir of the mind. 9. Death will not kill the person whose body is not inflamed by the fiery passion of love; which like the wild fire consumes the hoarded corn of good sense, and as a pair of sharp scissors rives the heart strings of reason. 10. Death doth not approach the man, that puts his trust in the one pure and purifying spirit of God, and hath the rest of his soul in the lap of the supreme soul.