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28
The Bhāgavata-purāņa
[CH. out that the influence of the praksti is limited to the image of puruṣa in the prakrti, and that, being reflected in the prakrti, the one purusa throws a shadow of infinite selves. These selves are deluded by egoism and consider themselves to be active agents, and, though there are no real births and rebirths, yet they continue to suffer the bondage of the samsāra cycle like a man who suffers from bad dreams.
Those who wish to be emancipated should therefore steadily practise disinclination from worldly joys and keen devotion. They should take to the path of self-control, make their minds free of enmity to all beings, practise equality, sex-control and silence, should remain contented with anything that comes in their way, and should have a firm devotion to God. When they leave their false self-love and egoism and can realize the truth about prakyti and puruşa, viz. that the latter is the unconditioned and underlying reality of all, as the one Sun which creates illusions like its reflections in the water; when they understand that the real self, the ultimate reality, is always experienced as the underlying being which manifests our biological, sensory and psychical personality or egohood, and that this reality is realized in deep dreamless sleep (when this egohood temporarily ceases to exist), they attain their real emancipation. The well-known yoga accessories mentioned by Patañjali, such as non-injury, truthfulness, non-stealing, contentment with the bare necessities of life, purity, study, patience, control of the senses, are also regarded as a necessary preparation for self-advancement. The practice of postures (asana), breathcontrol (prānāyāma), and that of holding the mind steadily on particular objects of concentration, are also advised as methods of purifying the mind. When the mind is thus purified and concentration practised, one should think of God and His great qualities?. Devotion to God is regarded as the second means of attaining right knowledge and wisdom about the oneness of the ultimate and the relation between the prakrti and the illusory individual selves. Thus it is said that, when one meditates upon the beautiful transcendent and resplendent form of Hari and is intoxicated with love for Him, one's heart melts through devotion, through excess of emotion one's hair stands on end, and one floats in tears of excessive delight through yearning after God; it is thus that the hook of the i Bhāgavata-purāna, III. 27.
2 Ibid. III. 28.
