24. As the ignorant rustic is afraid at the sight of the earthen images of ghosts, and bends down to them; which those that are acquainted with the meaning of the word ghost never do. 25. So those that see God in an idol or in his visible creation, are misled to think it their god and adore it as such; but those that know the true meaning of the term, never pay their adoration to any visible object. 26. As things in motion come to rest afterwards, and the visible disappear from the sight of the learned, who are acquainted with their true meaning. (The world recedes, and the light of God opens to their view). 27. As the sights in a dream, seeming to be true in the state of dreaming, disperse at last upon waking, and upon the knowledge of their unreal nature. 28. So doth this world, which is conceived as something existing in the vacuum of the understanding; melts at last into empty air and nothing, upon our knowledge of its intellectual nature. 29. This living world is as a wilderness, burning with the conflagration of various evils attendant on life; and here we are exposed as weak antelopes, living upon our precarious sustenances; and here we are governed by our ungovernable minds and restless passions and senses of our bodies; all these require to be subdued in order to obtain our liberation from repeated births and deaths. CHAPTER CLXIII. MEANS AND MANNER OF GOVERNING THE SENSES AND SENSIBLE ORGANS. Argument:--Government of the senses and fixedness of the Mind, and the study of yoga sástra. Ráma rejoined:--I know sir, all knowledge to be in vain and useless, without proper government of ourselves and senses; tell me therefore how these may be kept under control, in order to give us the true knowledge of things unbiased by the senses. 2. Vasishtha replied:--Addictedness to enjoyments and display of manhood, and devotedness to the acquisition of the means of life or wealth; are preventives of self-controul and liberation of one’s self, as blindness is an obstruction to one’s sight of a light. 3. Then listen to this least advice of mine as the shortest and best means, for the government of yourself and your senses; and this is sure to lead one to his successfulness, by his own endeavour and with no toil or trouble. 4. Know the intellect as the man that mans you, and its power of intellection which makes you a living man; and whatever the living soul thinks of within itself, it verily becomes the very same (but the ignorant man becomes effeminate). 5. Let the strength of your consciousness, ply the pointed goad of your acute good sense; and you will doubtless subdue your ungovernable elephantine mind, and come off victorious shortly at last. 6. The mind is the captain of the army of your bodily and mental senses; subdue therefore this leading mind, and you will conquer the whole host of your senses. Just so does a man walking on boots, tread over the thorns lying by his way.