And bear thee to the realms of death,
Whilst yet thou draw'st thy vital breath,—
My son, in grave and earnest mood,
Strive after right and rectitude.
Before the Ruler of the dead
Resistless, unimpassioned, dread,
Thy life, with every root and stay,
And bond of kinship, tears away;
Before the deadly tempest blows,
Which Yama's near approach foreshows;
Before the regions of the sky
Begin to whirl before thine eye;
Before thine ear to every sound
Is closed, and terror reigns around;
While yet thou art respited, care
For things unseen, for death prepare,
And sunk in meditation deep,
The fruits of holy knowledge reap.
Before the memories of thy life,-
So oft with right and good at strife,-
Of acts of thoughtless folly, rise,
To vex thy soul, now thou art wise,-
That only real treasure store,
Which thou shalt keep for evermore.
Before decay thy body wears,
And with it strength and beauty bears,
Those noblest treasures hoard in haste,
Which neither time nor chance can waste.
Before disease, stern charioteer,
Thy dire destroyer, death brings near,
Whose force thy feeble frame shall rend,—
In rites austere thy moments spend.
Before the hideous wolves which dwell
In mortals' bodies, fierce and fell,
Assail thy life on every side,
On virtue's pathway onward stride.
Make haste, before the fatal gloom
Round thy lone road begins to loom,
Before thine eye the golden trees
Above the mountain's summit sees.
Before from wisdom's hallowed way
By evil men thou'rt led astray ;-
Misled by foes that look like friends,-
With ardour seek the highest ends.
With ceaseless care amass that wealth
Which neither thieves can filch by stealth,+
Nor greedy tyrants snatch away,
Which even in death shall with thee stay.
The treasures which thou thus dost gain
For ever shall thine own remain.
Unshared shalt thou enjoy the meeds
Acquired by thine own righteous deeds.
Dismissing every vulgar care,
For yonder nobler life prepare.
To earth's attachments bid adieu,
And fix on higher bliss thy view.
The road which thou dost traverse swarms
With foes, with hornets' hideous forms.
Guard, then, thy works, as thou dost go,
Against the assaults of every foe.
When men with fear and anguished heart,
From hence to worlds unknown depart,
No band of kinsmen dear, or friends
With loving care their path attends.
Of what avail are stores untold,
Of jewels, silver, gems, and gold,
When, as the body's powers decay,
* The commentator states that to see golden trees is a sign of approaching death (Hiranya-vriksha-darśanam maranachihnam.
+ Compare Matthew vi. 19 ff.; Luke xii. 33.
The living spirit flits away?
Not all Kuvera's wealth could buy
A single hour of bliss on high,
Or those dire future pains avert,
Which justice claims for ill-desert.
When mortals leave behind them here
Their wealth, their friends, their kinsmen dear,
Have they no comrades on the road.
Which leads to Yama's dread abode ?
Yes, all the deeds that men have done,
In light of day, before the sun,t
Or veiled beneath the gloom of night,
The good, the bad, the wrong, the right,
These, though forgotten, reappear,
And travel, silent, in their rear.
And when their journey at an end,-
The dead before King Yama bend,
And from his lips the doom await
Which settles all their future fate,
What fittest witness then can rise
To speak the truth without disguise,
And all those deeds and thoughts reveal
Which living men would fain conceal,
As well as those good acts to tell
On which fond memory loves to dwell?
The conscious soul, the past which knows,
Itself that past can best disclose,
And all the secrets bring to light
Which once were closely wrapped in night.
Men living ever sinless here,
Shall soar to yonder higher sphere;
And, clothed in bodies bright and pure,
Shall gain the meeds their deeds ensure.
XXVIII. The only inseparable Friend.
Manu viii. 17; and iv. 239 ff.
Our virtue is the only friend
That follows us in death:
All other ties and friendships end
With our departing breath.
Nor father, mother, wife, nor son,
Beside us then can stay,
Nor kinsfolk; virtue is the one
Companion of our way.
Alone each creature sees the light,
Alone the world he leaves;
Alone of actions wrong or right
The recompense receives.
Like log or clod, beneath the sod
Their lifeless kinsmen laid,
His friends turn round and quit the ground;
But virtue speeds the dead.
Be then a hoard of virtue stored,
To help in day of doom.
By virtue sped, we cross the dread,
Immeasurable, gloom.
XXIX. "that is your life? Et is even a vapour." (James iv. 14; 1 Peter v. 8.)
Mahabharata xii. 12050 ff.
The body is it not like foam
The tossing wave an instant cresting?
In it the spirit, bird-like, resting,
Soon flies to seek another home.
In this thy frail abode, so dear,
How canst thou slumber free from fear?
Why dost thou not wake up, when all
Thy watchful enemies ever seek
To strike thee there where thou art weak,
To bring about thy longed-for fall?
Thy days are numbered,—all apace
Thy years roll on,-thy powers decay.
Why dost thou vainly then delay,
And not arise, and haste away
To some unchanging dwelling-place ?
XXX. No distinctions in the grabe.
Mahabharata xi. 88 ff; 116 ff.
Enslaved by various passions, men
Profound self-knowledge fail to gain.
Some yield to pride of birth, and scorn
All those in humbler stations born.
By wealth elated, some look down
On mortals cursed by Fortune's frown;
While others, trained in learning's schools,
Contemn the unlearned, and call them fools.
All quickly other's faults discern ;
Their own to check they never learn.
But soon a time arrives when all
The wise, the foolish, great and small,
The rich, the poor, the high, the low,
The proud, the humble hence must go :
Within the graveyard lone reclined,
Their pomp, their rags, they leave behind.
Soon, soon their lifeless frames a prey
Become to sure and sad decay.
When forms, once fair, of flesh are reft,
And skeletons alone are left,
Say, then, of all the bones around,
That strew the sad funereal ground,
What eye has power to recognize
Those of the rich, the great, the wise?
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