'
Form, good friend, a true idea of mundane matters; and bethink thee that
regret is after all but an illusion, an ignorance--
'An 'twere not so, would sorrow cease with years?
Wisdom sees aright what want of knowledge fears.'
'Kaundinya listened to all this with the air of a dreamer. Then rising
up he said, 'Enough! the house is hell to me--I will betake me to the
forest.'
'Will that stead you?' asked Kapila; 'nay--
'Seek not the wild, sad heart! thy passions haunt it;
Play hermit in thine house with heart undaunted;
A governed heart, thinking no thought but good,
Makes crowded houses holy solitude.'
To be master of one's self--to eat only to prolong life--to yield to
love no more than may suffice to perpetuate a family--and never to speak
but in the cause of truth, this,' said Kapila, 'is armor against grief.
What wouldst thou with a hermit's life--prayer and purification from
sorrow and sin in holy streams? Hear this!--
'Away with those that preach to us the washing off of sin--
Thine own self is the stream for thee to make ablutions in:
In self-restraint it rises pure--flows clear in tide of truth,
By widening banks of wisdom, in waves of peace and ruth.
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