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(4) If one is fortunate among men and wealthy, lord over others, best provided with all human enjoyments — that is the highest bliss of men. Now a hundredfold the bliss of men is one bliss of those who have won the fathers' world. Now a hundredfold the bliss of those who have won the fathers' world is one bliss in the Gandharva- world. A hundredfold the bliss in the Gandharva-world is one bliss of the gods who gain their divinity by meritorious works. A hundredfold the bliss of the gods by works is one bliss of the gods by birth and of him who is learned in the Vedas, who is without crook- edness, and who is free from desire. A hundredfold the bliss of the gods by birth is one bliss in the Prajapati- world and of him who is learned in the Vedas, who is without crookedness, and who is free from desire. A hundredfold the bliss in the Prajapati-world is one bliss in the Brahma-world and of him who is learned in the Vedas, who is without crookedness, and who is free from desire. This truly is the highest world. This is the Brahma-world, O king/ — Thus spake Yajnavalkya, [Janaka said:] c I will give you, noble Sir, a thousand [cows]. Speak further than this, for my release.' Then Yajnavalkya feared, thinking: ' This intelligent king has driven me out of every corner.' l

(2) He, who has felt a religious longing to participate in these truly supermundane gifts, comes to some one of the initiated, and persuades him to act as his conductor to the Hierarch. He then professes wholly to follow the teaching that shall be given to him, and prays him to undertake the superintendence of his introduction, and of all his after life. Now he, though religiously longing for his salvation, when he measures human infirmity against the loftiness of the undertaking, is suddenly seized with a shivering and sense of incapacity, nevertheless, at last, he agrees, with a good grace, to do what is requested, and takes and leads him to the chief Hierarch.

(1) Verily, the person here who knows this, is himself that Prajapati with the sixteen parts who is the year. The fifteen parts are his wealth. The sixteenth part is his self (atman). In wealth alone [not in self] is one increased and diminished. That which is the self (atman) is a hub; wealth, a felly. Therefore even if one is overcome by the loss of everything, provided he himself lives, people say merely. ' He has come off with the loss of a felly! ' The three worlds and how to win them j 6. Now, there are of a truth three worlds — the world of men, the world of the fathers, and the world of the gods.. This world of men is to be obtained by a son only, by no other means; the world of the fathers, by sacrifice; the world of the gods, by knowledge. The world of the gods is verily the best of worlds. Therefore they praise knowledge. A father's transmission to his son

(26) And then, with all the energisings of the harmony stript from him, clothed in his proper Power, he cometh to that Nature which belongs unto the Eighth, and there with those-that-are hymneth the Father. They who are there welcome his coming there with joy; and he, made like to them that sojourn there, doth further hear the Powers who are above the Nature that belongs unto the Eighth, singing their songs of praise to God in language of their own. And then they, in a band, go to the Father home; of their own selves they make surrender of themselves to Powers, and [thus] becoming Powers they are in God. This the good end for those who have gained Gnosis - to be made one with God. Why shouldst thou then delay? Must it not be, since thou hast all received, that thou shouldst to the worthy point the way, in order that through thee the race of mortal kind may by [thy] God be saved?

(2) He who forms desires in his mind, is born again through his desires here and there. But to him whose desires are fulfilled and who is conscious of the true Self (within himself) all desires vanish, even here on earth.

(19) When He said this, His Forethought did by means of Fate and Harmony effect their couplings and their generations founded. And so all things were multiplied according to their kind. And he who thus hath learned to know himself, hath reached that Good which doth transcend abundance; but he who through a love that leads astray, expends his love upon his body - he stays in Darkness wandering, and suffering through his senses things of Death.

(33) He, attracted by his own hope, tastes not the good things that are in the world, entertaining a noble contempt for all things here; pitying those that are chastised after death, who through punishment unwillingly make confession; having a clear conscience with reference to his departure, and being always ready, as "a stranger and pilgrim," with regard to the inheritances here; mindful only of those that are his own, and regarding all things here as not his own; not only admiring the Lord's commandments, but, so to speak, being by knowledge itself partaker of the divine will; a truly chosen intimate of the Lord and His commands in virtue of being righteous; and princely and kingly as being a Gnostic; despising all the gold on earth and under the earth, and dominion from shore to shore of ocean, so that he may cling to the sole service of the Lord. Wherefore also, in eating, and drinking, and marrying (if the Word enjoin), and even in seeing dreams, he does and thinks what is holy.

(4) On this point there is this verse: Where one's mind is attached — the inner self Goes thereto with action, being attached to it alone. Obtaining the end of his action, Whatever he does in this world, He comes again from that world To this world of action. — So the man who desires. The soul of the released Now the man who does not desire. — He who is without desire, who is freed from desire, whose desire is satisfied, whose desire is the Soul — his breaths do not depart. Being very Brahma, he goes to Brahma.

(220) In like manner his good works receive him who has done good, and has gone from this world to the other;--as kinsmen receive a friend on his return.

(6) "And he who hath received the master-mystery of the First Mystery of the Ineffable, that is the twelve mysteries of the First Mystery all together, which rule over all the spaces of the First Mystery, he, therefore, who shall receive that mystery, hath the power to pass through all the orders of the spaces of the three Thrice-spirituals and the three spaces of the First Mystery and all their orders, and hath the power to pass through all the orders of the inheritances of the Light, to pass through them from without within and from within without and from above below and from below above and from the height to the depth and from the depth to the height and from the length to the breadth and from the breadth to the length; in a word, he hath the power to pass through all the regions of the inheritances of the Light, and he hath the power to bide in the region where he pleaseth, in the Inheritance of the Light-kingdom. "And amēn, I say unto you: That man will at the dissolution of the world be king over all the orders of the Inheritance of the Light. And he who shall receive that mystery of the Ineffable which I am,

(4) And no one is a stranger to the world by nature, their essence being one, and God one. But the elect man dwells as a sojourner, knowing all things to be possessed and disposed of; and he makes use of the things which the Pythagoreans make out to be the threefold good things. The body, too, as one sent on a distant pilgrimage, uses inns and dwellings by the way, having care of the things of the world, of the places where he halts; but leaving his dwelling-place and property without excessive emotion; readily following him that leads him away from life; by no means and on no occasion turning back; giving thanks for his sojourn, and blessing [God] for his departure, embracing the mansion that is in heaven "For we know, that, if the earthly house of our tabernacle be dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, desiring to be clothed upon with our house which is from heaven: if so be that being clothed we shall not be found naked. For we by sight," as the apostle says; walk by faith, not "and we are willing rather to be absent from the body, and present with God." The rather is in comparison. And comparison obtains in the case of things that fall under resemblance; as the more valiant man is more valiant among the valiant, and most valiant among cowards. Whence he adds, "Wherefore we strive, whether present or absent, to be accepted with Him," that is, God, whose work and creation are all things, both the world and things supramundane. I admire Epicharmus, who clearly says: "Endowed with pious mind, you will not, in dying, Suffer aught evil. The spirit will dwell in heaven above;" and the minstrel who sings: "The souls of the wicked flit about below the skies on earth, In murderous pains beneath inevitable yokes of evils; But those of the pious dwell in the heavens, Hymning in songs the Great, the Blessed One."

(1) Everything, then, which falls under a name, is originated, whether they will or not. Whether, then, the Father Himself draws to Himself everyone who has led a pure life, and has reached the conception of the blessed and incorruptible nature; or whether the free-will which is in us, by reaching the knowledge of the good, leaps and bounds over the barriers, as the gymnasts say; yet it is not without eminent grace that the soul is winged, and soars, and is raised above the higher spheres, laying aside all that is heavy, and surrendering itself to its kindred element.

(18) 'He who knows the three Nâkiketa fires, and knowing the three, piles up the Nâkiketa sacrifice, he, having first thrown off the chains of death, rejoices in the world of heaven, beyond the reach of grief.'

(8) 'But he who has understanding, who is mindful and always pure, reaches indeed that place, from whence he is not born again.'

(10) Whatever state a man, whose nature is purified imagines, and whatever desires he desires (for himself or for others), that state he conquers and those desires he obtains. Therefore let every man who desires happiness worship the man who knows the Self.