“Thus have persons conversant with the Vedas spoken of the religion that leads to the attainment of Brahma.  They who follow that religion according to the measure of their knowledge all succeed in obtaining the highest end.  Even those persons who succeed in acquiring knowledge that is incapable of being shaken (by the assaults of scepticism) and that makes its possessors free from attachments of every kind, attain to various high regions after death and become emancipated according to the measure of their knowledge.  Those persons of pure hearts who have imbibed contentment from knowledge, and who have cast off all desires and attachments, gradually approach in respect of their nature, nearer and nearer to Brahma which has the unmanifest for his attribute, which is divine, and without birth and death.  Realising that Brahma dwells in their Souls, they become themselves immutable and have never to return (to the earth).  Attaining to that supreme state which is indestructible and eternal, they exist in felicity.  The knowledge with respect to this world is even this:  it exists (in the case of erring persons).  It does not exist (in the case of those who have not been stupefied by error).  The whole universe, bound up in desire, is revolving like a wheel.  As the fibres of a lotus-stalk overspread themselves into every part of the stalk, after the same manner the fibres of desire, which have neither beginning nor end, spread themselves over every part of the body.  As a weaver drives his threads into a cloth by means of his shuttle, after the same manner the threads that constitute the fabric of the universe are woven by the shuttle of Desire.  He who properly knows transformations of Prakriti, Prakriti herself and Purusha, becomes freed from Desire and attains to Emancipation.[792] The divine Rishi Narayana, that refuge of the universe, for the sake of compassion towards all creatures, clearly promulgated these means for the acquisition of immortality.’”

SECTION CCXVIII

“Yudhishthira said, ’By following what conduct, O thou that art conversant with all courses of conduct, did Janaka, the ruler of Mithila versed in the religion of Emancipation, succeed in attaining to Emancipation, after casting off all worldly enjoyments?’

“Bhishma said, ’In this connection is cited the following old narrative of the particular conduct by which that ruler, thoroughly conversant with all courses of conduct, succeeded in achieving the highest felicity.  There was a ruler in Mithila of the name of Janadeva of Janaka’s race.  He was ever engaged in reflecting upon the courses of conduct that might lead to the attainment of Brahma.  A century of preceptors always used to live in his palace, lecturing him upon the diverse courses of duty followed by people who had betaken themselves to diverse modes of life.[793] Given to the study of the Vedas, he was not very well satisfied with the speculations