Selected Speeches of V R Gandhi

Author(s): Virchand R Gandhi
Publisher: Vallabhsuri Smarak Nidhi Godiji Jain Derasar Mumbai

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of honey are falling on his lips. Just at this time, a minister of religion (like our respected brother Jones) happens to come there and offers him help to rescue him from the well, but the fellow seems quite satisfied with his lot while having the sweet taste of honey drops. He does not realize the fact that the whole trunk of the tree will be eaten away by the rats and then he would have no support at all; he would have to fall down to be swallowed by the cobra. This whole drama is represented in this picture." I said to my father, “Well, but what is the meaning of all this drama ?" He said, "It is all symbolical. This man in the well in this forest is the ordinary worldly man. The elephant that ran after him is death ; the well is this earthly life; the boa is the symbol of the lowest state of existence. The four snakes are the symbols of Anger, Vanity, Deceit and Greediness. The trunk of the banian tree is the short duration of our earthly life. The two rats, white and black, represent time, the light half and dark half of the month which exhaust our earthly duration. The bees in the honey-comb are the organs of senses and the honey-drops represent the sensuous pleasures. And the minister represents the Truth religion. So the whole thing comes to this. The common man of the world, thinking that his life will be cut off at any time by death satisfies himself by enjoying the sensuous pleasures derived from the senses and does not care to receive the truths offered by true philosophy, he being influenced by sentiments of anger, vanity, deceit and greediness represented by the four snakes."
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