The mind is more refined than the external senses; and the intellect is again more exalted than the mind. The prime sensitive particle is superior to the intellect; -nature, the apparent cause of the universe, is again superior to that particle unaffected by matter: Superior to nature is God, who is omnipresent and without material effects: by acquisition of whose knowledge man becomes extricated from ignorance and distress, and is absorbed into Him after death. His substance does not come within the reach of vision; no one can apprehend him through the senses: By constant direction of the intellect, free from doubts, he perspicuously appears; and those who know him in the prescribed manner, enjoy eternal life.

That part of life wherein the power of the five external senses and the mind are directed towards the Supreme Spirit, and the intellectual power ceases its action, is said to be most sacred; and this steady control of the senses and mind is considered to be Yog (or withdrawing the senses and the mind from worldly objects): Man should be vigilant in the acquisition of that state; for such control proceeds from constant exercise, and ceases by neglect.

Neither through speech, nor through intellectual power, nor yet through vision, can man acquire a knowledge of God; but, save him who believes in the existence of God as the cause of the universe, no one can have a notion of that Being. A man should acquire, first, a belief in the existence of God, the origin of the universe; and next, a real knowledge of him; to wit, that he is incomprehensible; for the means which lead men to acquire a knowledge of his existence, graciously

conduct them to the belief of his incomprehensibility. When all the desires settled in the heart leave man, the mortal then become immortal, and acquire absorption even in this life. When the deep ignorance which occasions duality is entirely destroyed, the mortal become immortal: This is the only doctrine which the Vedant inculcates.

There are one hundred and one tubes connected with the heart, one of which, called Sookhumna, proceeds to the head: The soul of a devotee proceeding through the hundred and first, is carried to the mansion of the immortal Bruhmá; and those of others, which ascend by other tubes, assume different bodies, according to the evil or good acts which they perform.

The omnipresent eternal spirit resides always within that space of the human heart which is as large as a finger: Man should, by firmness of mind, separate that spirit from the body, in the same manner as the pith is removed from the plant Moonju: that is, the spirit should be considered totally distinct from matter and the effects of matter—and man should know that separated spirit to be pure and eternal.

Having thus acquired this divine doctrine, imparted by the God of death, with every thing belonging to it, Nuchiketa, freed from the consequences of good or evil acts, and from mortality, was absorbed into God: and whatever person also can acquire that knowledge, shall obtain absorption.

End of the Kut'h-opunishud.