(336) He who overcomes this fierce thirst, difficult to be conquered in this world, sufferings fall off from him, like water-drops from a lotus leaf.

(1) 'Food (anna) is better than power. Therefore if a man abstain from food for ten days, though he live, he would be unable to see, hear, perceive, think, act, and understand. But when he obtains food, he is able to see, hear, perceive, think, act, and understand. Meditate on food.

(3) The mouth of N. had been thirsty; but he will never hunger (any more); N. will never thirst; for Chas delivers him and does away with hunger

(10) The body hungereth and thirsteth after the father of nature, viz. the stars and the elements, and that father feedeth and nourisheth the body.

(19) Manjusri asked: “What is the root of the body?”

Vimalakirti replied: “Craving is the root of the body.”

(3) 'Learn from me, my son, what are hunger and thirst. When a man is thus said to be hungry, water is carrying away (digests) what has been eaten by him. Therefore as they speak of a cow-leader (go-nâya), a horse-leader (asva-nâya), a man-leader (purusha-nâya), so they call water (which digests food and causes hunger) food-leader (asa-nâya). Thus (by food digested &c.), my son, know this offshoot (the body) to be brought forth, for this (body) could not be without a root (cause).

(97) So in this exsiccation or drying up, the unctuosness or fatness in the sweet water is killed or destroyed, in which the fire kindleth itself, and so out of that unctuosity or fatness an astringent and bitter spirit comes to be. For when the unctuosness or fat in the sweet water dieth, then it is turned into an anguishing sweat, in which the astringent and the bitter qualify, mix or unite.

(77) When the sweet quality perceiveth the taste of the bitter quality, it caggs at it [checks or stops it], and giveth back; even as a man, when he tasteth astringent, harsh or bitter gall, openeth both the gums of his palate [throat or jaws] in his mouth in his cagging, and wideneth his palate more than it is of itself; and just so does the sweet quality against the bitter.

(5) Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.

(85) But when it seeth that it is like to be taken or captivated (the bitter quality from within pressing so hard upon it, and the heat from without pressing upon it also), it makes the bitter fervent or burning, and inflameth it, and there it [the sweet quality] leapeth, springing up through the astringent quality, and riseth up again aloft; so there cometh to be a hard knot behind it in that place where the struggling was, and the knot gets a hole or orifice.

(338) 551 a. To say: Hunger, come not to N., 551 go away to Nun, be off (begging) to the gbi-flood. 551 N. is sated; 551 N. hungers not by reason of that bread of Horus which he has eaten, 551 which his head-maid made for him, with which he is satisfied, (and) whereby he wins back his (normal) condition. 552 N. thirsts not by reason of Shu; N. hungers not by reason of Tefnut. 552 pi, Dw-mw.t.f, b-n.w.f, 'Im.ti, 552 they will expel this hunger, which is in the body of N., 552 and this thirst which is on the lips of N.

(149) There the bitter quality raveth and rageth, and seeketh for rest and food, and finds it not, and moveth or boileth in the body as a lingering poison.

(2) So, likewise, in the millennium of Hûshêdar-mâh, the strength of appetite (âz) will thus diminish, when men will remain three days and nights in superabundance (sîrîh) through one taste of consecrated food.

(7) Then he eats with the following Rik verse at every foot: 'We choose that food'--here he swallows--'Of the divine Savitri (prâna)'--here he swallows--'The best and all-supporting food'--here he swallows--'We meditate on the speed of Bhaga (Savitri, prâna)'--here he drinks all.

(20) As with bodily pain and pleasure so with the bodily desires; their origin, also, must be attributed to what thus stands midway, to that Nature we described as the corporeal.

Body undetermined cannot be imagined to give rise to appetite and purpose, nor can pure soul be occupied about sweet and bitter: all this must belong to what is specifically body but chooses to be something else as well, and so has acquired a restless movement unknown to the soul and by that acquisition is forced to aim at a variety of objects, to seek, as its changing states demand, sweet or bitter, water or warmth, with none of which it could have any concern if it remained untouched by life.

In the case of pleasure and pain we showed how upon distress follows the knowledge of it, and that the soul, seeking to alienate what is causing the condition, inspires a withdrawal which the member primarily affected has itself indicated, in its own mode, by its contraction. Similarly in the case of desire: there is the knowledge in the sensation and in the next lower phase, that described as the "Nature" which carries the imprint of the soul to the body; that Nature knows the fully formed desire which is the culmination of the less formed desire in body; sensation knows the image thence imprinted upon the Nature; and from the moment of the sensation the soul, which alone is competent, acts upon it, sometimes procuring, sometimes on the contrary resisting, taking control and paying heed neither to that which originated the desire nor to that which subsequently entertained it.

But why, thus, two phases of desire; why should not the body as a determined entity be the sole desirer?

Because there are two distinct things, this Nature and the body, which, through it, becomes a living being: the Nature precedes the determined body which is its creation, made and shaped by it; it cannot originate the desires; they must belong to the living body meeting the experiences of this life and seeking in its distress to alter its state, to substitute pleasure for pain, sufficiency for want: this Nature must be like a mother reading the wishes of a suffering child, and seeking to set it right and to bring it back to herself; in her search for the remedy she attaches herself by that very concern to the sufferer's desire and makes the child's experience her own.

In sum, the living body may be said to desire of its own motion in a fore-desiring with, perhaps, purpose as well; Nature desires for, and because of, that living body; granting or withholding belongs to another again, the higher soul.

(86) But when the sweet water can defend itself no longer, then anguish riseth up in it; just as in man, when he is dying, when the spirit is departing from the body, and so the body yieldeth itself captive as a prisoner to death; just so the water also yieldeth itself captive as a prisoner.

(3) In sitting down, after dropping the lids, one establishes a plumb-line with the eyes and shifts the Light downward. But if the transposition downward is not successful, then the heart is directed toward listening to the breathing. One should not be able to hear with the ear the out- going and intaking of the breath. What one hears is that it has no tone. As soon as it has tone, the breathing is rough and superficial, and does not penetrate into what is ine. Then the heart must be made quite light and insigni icant. The more it is released, the less important it becomes; the less important, the quieter. All at once it becomes so quiet that it stops. Then the true breathing is manifested and the form of the heart can be made conscious. When the heart is light, the breathing is light, for every movement of the heart brings about breathing power. If the breathing is light, the heart is light, for every movement of the breath affects the heart. In order to steady the heart, one begins by cultivating the breathing power. The heart cannot be in luenced directly. Therefore the breathing power is used as a handle, and this is what is called protecting the collected breathing power.

(11) But the soul thirsteth after the heavenly holy Father, and he giveth meat and drink to it, feeding it with his holy Spirit, and the spring, source or fountain of joy.

(85) So when that is done, then the bitterness is also together captivated or imprisoned in the body of the sweet water, and becometh also together dried up, and then the astringent, the sweet and the bitter are one in another, and struggle so strongly in the dried mass or lump till the mass be quite dry: For the astringent quality always contracteth it together, and drieth it more and more.

(79) Now when the astringent or harsh and the bitter qualities get their light from the heat, then they see the sweet quality, and taste of its sweet water, and then they continually make haste after the sweet water, and drink it up, for they are very hard, rough and thirsty, and the heat drieth them quite up.