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
51. As the ærial castle of our imagination, has no building nor reality
in it; so is this world but a calm and quiet vacuity, and unfailing
vacant ideality.
52. It is a boundless space full with the essence of the Supreme
spirit, it is without its beginning and end, wholly inscrutable in its
nature, and quite calm and quiet in its aspect.
53. I have known my own state also, to be without its birth and death,
and as calm and quiet, as that of the unborn and immortal Brahma
himself; and I have come to know myself (_i.e._ my soul) also, to be as
formless and undefinable, as the Supreme soul or spirit.
54. I have now given expression, to all that I find to be impressed in
my consciousness; just as whatever is contained in the seed, the same
comes to sprout forth out of it.
55. I know only the knowledge that I bear in my consciousness, and
nothing about the unity or duality (of the creation and creator);
because the question of unity and duality rises only from imagination
(of the one or other).
56. All these knowing and living liberated men, that have been
liberated from the burthen of life by their knowledge of truth; are
sitting silent here, and devoid of all their earthly cares, like the
empty air in the infinite vacuity.
57. All their efforts of mixing with the busy bustle of the world,
are here at an end; and they are sitting here as quiet and silent as
yon mute and motionless picture on the wall, medalling on the bright
regions in their minds.
58. They are as still as the statues engraven in a rock, or as people
described in fancy tales, to dwell in the ærial city built by Sambara
in air (_i.e._ as the inhabitants dwelling in the Elysian of Plato, or
in the utopia of Sir Thomas Moore); or as the airy figures in our dream.
59. This world is verily a phantom appearing in our dream of the
creation; it is a structure without its base, and a figure intangible
to our touch. Where then is its reality? (Its tangibleness is a
deception of our sense).
60. The world appears as a positive reality to the blinded ignorant,
but it <is> found to be a negative nullity by the keen-sighted sage;
who sees it in the light of Brahma and a manifestation of himself,
and as still as the calm air, reposing in the quiet vacuity of that
transcendent spirit.
61. All these existences, with their moving and unmoving beings, and
ourselves also, are mere void and vacant nullities, in the knowledge of
the discerning and philosophic mind.
62. I am void and so are you too, and the world beside but mere blanks;
the intellect is a void also, and by having all several voids in
itself, it forms the immense intellectual vacuum, which is the sole
object of our adoration (being as infinite and eternal, as well as all
pervading and containing all as the supreme spirit).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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