Sage Vasishtha
The decadent concept of the world-existence lies imprisoned in the senses, bound by self-limitation and conditioning and by the powerful thread of hopes and desires. This world-appearance is like a delicate creeper which constantly trembles in the wind of the movement of prana or life-force and which constantly sheds all kinds of beings, abandoning them to their destruction.
There are many noble people who have risen above the quagmire of this hell known as world-existence and, devoid of all doubt, rejoice for a little while. There are the divine beings who dwell like lotuses in the blue expanse of the firmament.
In this creation, actions are like the lotus which is polluted by vain desire for the fruits of such actions, which is caught in the net of psychological conditioning and which is endowed with the perfume of dynamism. But, this world-appearance is like a little fish which comes into being in this finite space and which is soon swallowed by the obstinate and invincible old vulture known as kranta (the end or conclusion of action). Yet, diverse scenes arise and cease day after day, as ripples and waves appear and disappear on the surface of the ocean. The potter known as time keeps all these revolving like the potter's wheel. Innumerable forests known as creation have been reduced to ashes by the forest-fire known as time. Such is the state of this creation. But since the ignorant are bound fast to their own false notions, neither the transiency of the world nor the hard blow they suffer in their life is able to awaken them.
This psychological conditioning or self-limitation persists during the whole world-cycle, like the body of the chief of the gods, Indra. As if by accident, in the midst of all this there occur divine manifestations in whom the purest nature is revealed.
Whereas the immobile creatures stand contemplating the mystery of time, as it were, the mobile creatures swayed by the twin-forces of attraction and repulsion, love and hate, and afflicted by the terrible illness known as pleasure and pain, old age and death, become debilitated and decadent. Among the latter, the worms and vermin silently and patiently endure the fruits of their own past evil actions, contemplating them, as it were, all the time. But the imperceptible time (or death) which is beyond even contemplation devours all and everything.
There are many noble people who have risen above the quagmire of this hell known as world-existence and, devoid of all doubt, rejoice for a little while. There are the divine beings who dwell like lotuses in the blue expanse of the firmament.
In this creation, actions are like the lotus which is polluted by vain desire for the fruits of such actions, which is caught in the net of psychological conditioning and which is endowed with the perfume of dynamism. But, this world-appearance is like a little fish which comes into being in this finite space and which is soon swallowed by the obstinate and invincible old vulture known as kranta (the end or conclusion of action). Yet, diverse scenes arise and cease day after day, as ripples and waves appear and disappear on the surface of the ocean. The potter known as time keeps all these revolving like the potter's wheel. Innumerable forests known as creation have been reduced to ashes by the forest-fire known as time. Such is the state of this creation. But since the ignorant are bound fast to their own false notions, neither the transiency of the world nor the hard blow they suffer in their life is able to awaken them.
This psychological conditioning or self-limitation persists during the whole world-cycle, like the body of the chief of the gods, Indra. As if by accident, in the midst of all this there occur divine manifestations in whom the purest nature is revealed.
Whereas the immobile creatures stand contemplating the mystery of time, as it were, the mobile creatures swayed by the twin-forces of attraction and repulsion, love and hate, and afflicted by the terrible illness known as pleasure and pain, old age and death, become debilitated and decadent. Among the latter, the worms and vermin silently and patiently endure the fruits of their own past evil actions, contemplating them, as it were, all the time. But the imperceptible time (or death) which is beyond even contemplation devours all and everything.
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