Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 568

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CHAPTER XXXV
A
— Meditation. — Its
SainiyasPs
What
Principal Duties.
consists of, and how
it
Remarks.
who
—
Various
Stages.
—
Hindu Devotees practise it. General
Comparisons between the Hindu Sannyasis and those
lead Similar Lives
among
Christians.
A sannyasi's first
and most important duty is to destroy,
root and branch, any feeling of attachment that may still
linger in his heart for the world and its vain pleasures.
Wife, children, parents, friends, caste privileges, cattle,
lands, jewels and other temporal possessions, animal
passions, sensual pleasures
all these are but so many
obstacles standing in the way of his soul's perfection.
In
—
Hindu books they are likened variously to thick clouds
which, until they are dispersed, obscure the light of the
sun, or to violent winds that disturb the surface of the
water and prevent the reflection of this luminary in all its
splendour to the coils which caterpillars and other in-
sects form, and of which they cannot rid themselves
or
again to the kernels of certain fruits in which grubs and
maggots are imprisoned.
Such are the similes which Hindu authors make use of
when trying to give some idea of the hindrances which
earthly passions oppose to spirituality, and which must be
overcome before perfection can be attained and the soul
reunited to the Divine Being. Nevertheless, these same
authors add, the tenements in which caterpillars and grubs
confine themselves do not hold them captive for ever.
Neither do the insects cease to exist. After remaining for
some time in a state of torpor and quiescence, the feeble
spark of life which they still retain rekindles and gradually
increases in strength till the insects are able to destroy the
covering in which they are enclosed, and, by dint of per-
severing labour, at last open out a passage to the region
of light and liberty.
So it is with the soul. The body in
which it is imprisoned, and which is a prey to worldly
cares and tumultuous passions, will not hold it for ever.
After many re-incarnations the spark of perfect wisdom,
which is latent in every man, will burn more brightly,
until the soul at last succeeds, after a long course of penance
and meditation, in breaking asunder, little by little, all the
;
;