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CHAPTER XX, 22.
313
and the severance also, and likewise unity and variety!, is released from misery. He who does not desire anything, and has no egoism about anything, becomes eligible for assimilation with the Brahman, even while dwelling in this world. He who knows the truth about the qualities of nature, who understands the creation of all entities, who is devoid of (the thought that this or that is) mine, and who is devoid of egoism, is emancipated; there is no doubt of that. Accurately understanding the great (tree) of which the unperceived ® is the sprout from the seed, which consists of the understanding as its trunk, the branches of which are the great egoism, in the holes of which are the sprouts, namely, the senses, of which the great elements are the flower-bunches ", the gross elements the smaller boughs, which is always possessed of leaves, always possessed of flowers, and from which pleasant fruits are always produced, on which all entities subsist, which is eternal, and the seed of which is the Brahman; and cutting it with that excellent sword-knowledge-one attains immortality, and casts off birth and death. I will state to you to-day, O highly
' I.e. that variety is only in this world, but that the unity of everything is the true proposition. Cf. inter alia Gità, p. 104.
• Cf. Brihadaranyaka, p. 858, and Gitá, p. 65. ' I. c. the Prakriti of the Sankhyas.
• The great elements are the five tanmatras of earth, water, fre, air, and space, which afterwards produce what we have called the gross elements in the text, namely, the earth &c. which we perceive.
The wee typifies worldly life. Cf. pp. 111-189 supra. The leaves and flowers, Arguna Misra says, stand for volition and action; and Nilakantha seems to agree. The tree is called cternal, as worldly life is supposed to have had no beginning. Cl. Säriraka Bhashya, p. 494, 'sprout from the seed,' this rendering is necessilated by Brahman being described as the seed. Cl. Mundaka, p. 288; Sveräsvatara, p. 362; Katha, pp. 143, 144.
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