SECTION CCXXVI

“Bhishma said, ’In this connection is also cited the old narrative of the discourse between him of a hundred sacrifices and the Asura Namuchi, O Yudhishthira.  When the Asura Namuchi, who was conversant with the birth and the death of all creatures, was sitting, divested of prosperity but untroubled at heart like the vast ocean in perfect stillness, Purandara addressed him these:  words, ’Fallen off from thy place, bound with cords, brought under the sway of thy foes, and divested of prosperity, dost thou, O Namuchi, indulge in grief or passest thou thy days cheerfully?’

“Namuchi answered, ’By indulging in such sorrow as cannot be warded off one only wastes one’s body and gladdens one’s foes.  Then, again, no one can lighten another’s sorrow by taking any portion of it upon oneself.  For these reasons, O Sakra, I do not indulge in sorrow.  All this that thou seest hath one end.[849] Indulgence in sorrow destroys personal comeliness, prosperity, life, and virtue itself, O chief of the deities!  Without doubt, suppressing that sorrow which comes upon oneself and which is born of an improper disposition of the mind, one possessed of true knowledge should reflect in one’s mind of that which is productive of the highest good and which dwells in the heart itself.[850] When one sets one’s mind upon what is for one’s highest good, without doubt, the result that takes place is that one’s objects are all accomplished.[851] There is One Ordainer, and no second.  His control extends over the being that lies within the womb.  Controlled by the great Ordainer I go on as He sets me on, like water running along a downward path.  Knowing what is existence and what is emancipation, and understanding also that the latter is superior to the former, I do not, however, strive for attaining to it.  Doing acts that tend towards the direction of virtue and also those that tend towards the opposite direction, I go on as He sets me on.  One gets those things that are ordained to be got.  That which is to happen actually happens.  One has repeatedly to reside in such wombs in which one is placed by the Ordainer.  One has no choice in the matter.  That person is never stupefied, who when placed in any particular condition, accepts it as that which he was ordained to be placed in.  Men are affected by pleasure and pain that come by turns in course of Time.  There is no personal agency (in the matter of pleasure or pain to any one).  In this lies sorrow, viz., that he that dislikes sorrow regards himself as the actor.[852] Amongst Rishis, gods, great Asuras, persons fully conversant with the three Vedas, and ascetics in the forest, who is there whom calamities do not approach?  Those, however, that are conversant with the Soul and that which is not-Soul never fear calamities.  The person of wisdom, naturally standing immovable like Himavat, never gives way to wrath; never suffers himself