(345) Wise people do not call that a strong fetter which is made of iron, wood, or hemp; far stronger is the care for precious stones and rings, for sons and a wife.

(3) Such is the hateful cloak thou wearest - that throttles thee [and holds thee] down to it, in order that thou may'st not gaze above, and having seen the Beauty of the Truth, and Good that dwells therein, detest the bad of it; having found out the plot that it hath schemed against thee, by making void of sense those seeming things which men think senses. For that it hath with mass of matter blocked them up and crammed them full of loathsome lust, so that thou may'st not hear about the things that thou should'st hear, nor see the things thou should'st see.

(346) That fetter wise people call strong which drags down, yields, but is difficult to undo; after having cut this at last, people leave the world, free from cares, and leaving desires and pleasures behind.

(8) The desires beget harm in this world and beyond: here, by bondage, slaughter, and loss of limb; beyond, in hell. That for the sake of which thou hast bowed many a time before bawds, heeding not sin nor infamy, and cast thyself into peril and wasted thy substance, that which by its embrace has brought thee supreme delight — it is naught but bones, now free and unpossessed; wilt thou not take thy fill of embraces now, and delight thyself? This was the face that erstwhile turned downwards in modesty and was unwilling to look up, hidden behind a veil whether eyes gazed upon it or gazed not; and this face now the vultures unveil to thee, as though they could not bear thy impatience. Look on it — why dost thou flee now from it?...

(10) Take, for instance, the case of a man who has sold a slave girl without knowing how much he was attached to her till she is quite out of his reach. Then the love of her, hitherto dormant, wakes up in him with such intensity as to amount to torture, stinging him like a snake, so that he would fain, cast himself into fire or water to escape it. Such is the effect of love of the world, which those who have it often suspect not till the world is taken from them, and then the torment of vain longing is such that they would gladly exchange it for any number of mere external snakes and scorpions.