and water.[47] What is the need of other discourses that are even fraught with other kinds of morality and righteousness, unto those persons who do not like to live even a moment without thinking of feet of Mahadeva?  When the unrighteous or sinful Kali Yuga comes, one should never pass a moment without devoting his heart upon Mahadeva.  One that has drunk the Amrita constituted by the devotion to Hara, one becomes freed from the fear of the world.  One that has not obtained the grace of Mahadeva can never succeed to devote oneself to Mahadeva for a single day or for half a day or for a Muhurta or for a Kshana or for a Lava (very small unit of time).  At the command of Mahadeva I shall cheerfully become a worm or an insect, but I have no relish for even the sovereignty of the three worlds, if bestowed by thee, O Sakra.  At the word of Hara I would become even a dog.  In fact, that would accord with my highest wish.  If not given by Maheswara, I would not have the sovereignty of the very deities.  I do not wish to have this dominion of the Heavens.  I do not wish to have the sovereignty of the celestials.  I do not wish to have the region of Brahma.  Indeed, I do not wish to have that cessation of individual existence which is called Emancipation and which involves a complete identification with Brahma.  But I want to become the slave of Hara.  As long as that Lord of all creatures, the illustrious Mahesa, with crown on his head and body possessed of the pure white complexion of the lunar disc, does not become gratified with me, so long shall I cheerfully bear all those afflictions, due to a hundred repetitions of decrepitude, death and birth, that befall to the lot of embodied beings.  What person in the universe can obtain tranquillity, without gratifying Rudra that is freed from decripitude and death, that is endued with the effulgence of the Sun, the Moon, or the fire, that is the root or original cause of everything real and unreal in the three worlds, and that exists as one and indivisible entity?  If in consequence of my faults, rebirths be mine, I shall, in those new births, devote myself solely to Bhava.’”

“Indra said, ’What reason canst thou assign for the existence of a Supreme Being or for His being the cause of all causes?’”

“Upamanyu said, ’I solicit boons from that great Deity named Siva whom utterers of Brahma has described as existent and non-existent, manifest and unmanifest, eternal or immutable, one and many.  I solicit boons from Him who is without beginning and middle and end, who is Knowledge and Puissance, who is inconceivable and who is the Supreme Soul.  I solicit boons from Him whence comes all Puissance, who has not been produced by any one, who is immutable, and who, though himself unsprung from any seed, is the seed of all things in the universe.  I solicit boons from Him who is blazing Effulgence, (beyond Darkness) who is the essence of all penances, who transcends all faculties of which we are possessed