THE QUALIFICATIONS FOR DELIVERANCE 19

me, in far past ages, to quench with its pellucid waters the fire
of the great feud between us, and to help all growing" souls at
the same time, on the pine-crowned summits of Mount
Nishadha ? Brahman ! re-utter then that teaching to this
most deserving pupil."

To this the Munis, all with one accord, said, "It were
well."

Vasishtha, then, son of the Lotus-Born, and glorious as
his Father, said ; "O Muni !, I shall do what thou hast asked
of me, for how can I refuse thy wish, a wish that seeks the
truest welfare of the sons of Dasharatha. ' For their sake shall
I call to mind again unbrokenly the teaching given us by
Svayam-bhu, the Self-Born."

CHAPTER III
The JPace of Progress.

Here Rama asked a question of Vasishtha : *'How is it
that Shuka's father Vyasa, who knows all, has not attained to
such Deliverance as his son ?"

And he replied : "The swarms of worlds that came into
existence in the Past, and passed away, within the Light of the
Great Central Sun ; the worlds that throng it thickly Now as
motes the rays of the sun visible ; the worlds again that will
be formed and be destroyed in the Future—these may not be
counted. The Jivas(1) that are born in them again and yet
again, passing through worlds within enwrapping worlds,
subtle and subtler, even as the layers of skin that fold
successively the heart of the plantain stem, these Jivas are not

inverted over a sphere of water, with. the capes as the apices of the
petals. The presiding deity, "Oolleotiye and vast Mind." also called
Svayam-bhu, ie said, in Pnranio myth, to arise out of and sit on this*
(X) Individual souls, embodied*