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CHAPTER ONE or is troubled by an attack of indigestion, or is occupied by a miserable tumor called 'arbuda,' or stupefied by diarrhoea, or seized by constipation, or obstructed by an abscess, or tormented by the scrotum, or filled with asthma, or destroyed by gouty pain, a man always attains death by numerous diseases such as these or others near at hand like messengers of Křtānta.
Nevertheless, considering himself immortal, a man, stupid as an animal, does not set out to take the fruit of the tree of a life-time. 'Oh! I have poor brothers; I have young sons now; this daughter is unmarried; this boy must be educated; my wife is newly married ; my parents are old; my father- and mother-in-law are unfortunate; my sister is widowed. Thinking that these people must be protected forever, a stupid man does not know that the ocean of existence is like a stone tied to the heart.
'I was not delighted today by the happiness of embracing my beloved's body; I did not smell the pudding ; my desire for a wreath was not fulfilled; the wish for the sight of pleasing objects was not satisfied; I am not at all pleased with the songs of the lute, flute, etc.; the storehouse was not filled today for the household ; the old house that I tore down was not renewed ; I did not undertake the final training of the horses that had come; these fast bullocks were not driven to the best chariot.
So the foolish suffers remorse even at death. Never in the least does he regret, 'I did not practice dharma.' Here death is always ready; there are various sudden deaths ; diseases are here; and many anxieties there. On the one hand are love, hate, etc., enemies always ready; on the other are strong passions causing death like battles. There is nothing at all that conduces to happiness in this samsāra which is like a desert. A man, alas ! does not become disgusted with existence, thinking, 'I am living in a comfortable place.' Death, the sudden destroyer of life, quickly falls upon the one bewildered by the fallacy of pleasure, like a night-attack upon a sleeper. Verily, the
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