nk, with long hair flowing to the ground, silent
as a Muni, seeking nothing, in this way practising austerities, in the
end lust shall be destroyed. Know then, that the province of the five
desires is avowedly an enemy of the religious man. Even the
one-thousand-armed invincible king, strong in his might, finds it hard
to conquer this. The Rishi Rama perished because of lust; how much more
ought I, the son of a Kshatriya, to restrain lustful desire; but indulge
in lust a little, and like the child it grows apace, the wise man hates
it therefore; who would take poison for food? every sorrow is increased
and cherished by the offices of lust. If there is no lustful desire, the
risings of sorrow are not produced, the wise man seeing the bitterness
of sorrow, stamps out and destroys the risings of desire; that which the
world calls virtue, is but another form of this baneful law; worldly men
enjoying the pleasure of covetous desire then every form of careless
conduct results; these careless ways producing hurt, at death, the
subject of them reaps perdition. But by the diligent use of means, and
careful continuance therein, the consequences of negligence are avoided,
we should therefore dread the non-use of means; recollecting that all
things are illusory, the wise man covets them not; he who desires such
things, desires sorrow, and then goes on again ensnared in love, with no
certainty of ultimate freedom; he advances still and ever adds grief to
grief, like one holding a lighted torch burns his hand, and therefore
the wise man enters on no such things. The foolish man and the one who
doubts, still encouraging the covetous and burning heart, in the end
receives accumulated sorrow, not to be remedied by any prospect of rest;
covetousness and anger are as the serpent's poison; the wise man casts
away the approach of sorrow as a rotten bone; he tastes it not nor
touches it, lest it should corrupt his teeth, that which the wise man
will not take, the king will go through fire and water to obtain, the
wicked sons labor for wealth as for a piece of putrid flesh, o'er which
the hungry flocks of birds contend. So should we regard riches; the wise
man is ill pleased at having wealth stored up, the mind wild with
anxious thoughts, guarding himself by night and day, as a man who fears
some powerful enemy, like as a man's feelings revolt with disgust at the
sights seen beneath the slaughter post of the East Market; so the high
post which