The Yoga-Vasishtha Maharamayana of Valmiki, Vol. 4 (of 4), Part 2 (of 2)Valmiki
Religion
The Yoga-Vasishtha Maharamayana of Valmiki, Vol. 4 (of 4), Part 2 (of 2)
Valmiki
Hinduism -- Doctrines -- Early works to 1800; Religious life -- Hinduism -- Early works to 1800
36. It is intelligence which constitutes the living soul of the body,
which is otherwise said to be lifeless and insensible; it resides in
all bodies like the air in empty pots, and becomes vivid in some and
imperceptible in others as it likes.
37. It is its knowledge of the soul (_i.e._ the intellectual belief in
its spiritual), that removes the error of its corporeity; while the
ignorance of its spiritual nature, tends the more to foster the sense
of its corporeality, like one’s erroneous conception of water in the
mirage.
38. The mind is as minute as the minutest ray of sunbeams; and this is
verily the living soul, which contains the whole world within it.
39. All this phenomenal world is the phenomenon of the mind, as it is
displayed in its visionary dreams; and the same being the display of
the living soul, there is no difference at all between the noumenal and
the phenomenal.
40. The intellect alone is assimilated into all these substances, which
have substantiality of their own; whatever is seen without it, is
like its visionary dream, or as the forms of jewelleries made of the
substance of gold. (_i.e._ The intellect is the intrinsic essence of
all external substances).
41. As the same water of the one universal ocean, appears different in
different places; and in its multifarious forms of waves and billows;
so doth the divine intellect exhibit the various forms of visibles
in itself. (_i.e._ Nothing is without or different from the divine
essence).
42. As the fluid body of waters, rolls on incessantly in sundry shapes
within the basin of the great deep; so do these multitudes of visible
things, which are inherent in and identic with the divine intellect,
glide on forever in its fathomless bosom.
43. All these worlds are situated as statues, or they are engraved as
sculptures in the aerial column of the divine intellect; and are alike
immovable and without any motion of theirs through all eternity.
44. We see the situation of the world, in the vacuous space of our
consciousness; as we see the appearances of things in our airy dreams.
We find moreover everything transfixed in its own sphere and place, and
continuing in its own state, without any change of its position or any
alteration in its nature. (The invariable course of nature, is not the
fortuitous production of blind chance).
45. The exact conformity of everything in this world, with its
conception in the mind of man, with respect to their invariable
equality in form and property, proves their identity with one another,
or the relation of one being the container of the other. (_i.e._ The
mind is either same with or container of the world).
46. There is no difference between the phenomenal and noumenal worlds,
as there <is> none between those in our dream and imagination. They
are in fact, the one and same thing, as the identity of the waters,
contained in tanks, rivers and seas, and between the curse and blessing
of gods.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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