of the Atman. Not for the wife's sake is
the wife dear but for the sake of the Atman. Not for their own sake are
sons, wealth, Brahmans, warriors, worlds, gods, Vedas and all things
dear, but for the sake of the Atman. The Atman is to be seen, to be
heard, to be perceived, to be marked: by him who has seen and known the
Atman all the universe is known.... He who looks for Brahmans, warriors,
worlds, gods or Vedas anywhere but in the Atman, loses them all...."

"As all waters have their meeting place in the sea, all touch in the
skin, all tastes in the tongue, all odours in the nose, all colours in
the eye, all sounds in the ear, all percepts in the mind, all knowledge
in the heart, all actions in the hands....As a lump of salt has no
inside nor outside and is nothing but taste, so has this Atman neither
inside nor outside and is nothing but knowledge. Having risen from out
these elements it (the human soul) vanishes with them. When it has
departed (after death) there is no more consciousness." Here Maitreyi
professes herself bewildered but Yajnavalkya continues "I say nothing
bewildering. Verily, beloved, that Atman is imperishable and
indestructible. When there is as it were duality, then one sees the
other, one tastes the other, one salutes the other, one hears the other,
one touches the other, one knows the other. But when the Atman only is
all this, how should we see, taste, hear, touch or know another? How can
we know him by whose power we know all this? That Atman is to be
described by no, no (neti, neti). He is incomprehensible for he cannot
be comprehended, indestructible for he cannot be destroyed, unattached
for he does not attach himself: he knows no bonds, no suffering, no
decay. How, O beloved, can one know the knower?" And having so spoken,
Yajnavalkya went away into the forest. In another verse of the same work
it is declared that "This great unborn Atman (or Self) undecaying,
undying, immortal, fearless, is indeed Brahman."

It is interesting that this doctrine, evidently regarded as the
quintessence of Yajnavalkya's knowledge, should be imparted to a woman.
It is not easy to translate. Atman, of course, means self and is so
rendered by Max Mueller in this passage, but it seems to me that this
rendering jars on the English ear for it inevitably suggests the
individual self and selfishness, whereas Atman means the universal
spirit which is Self, because it is the highest (or only) Reality and
Being, not