The morning of that epoch consists of four hundred years and its evening is of four hundred years. (The total duration, therefore, of the Krita yuga is four thousand and eight hundred years of the deities). As regards the other yugas, the duration of each gradually decreases by a quarter in respect of both the substantive period with the conjoining portion and the conjoining portion itself. (Thus the duration of the Treta is three thousand years and its morning extends for three hundred years and its evening for three hundred). The duration of the Dwapara also is two thousand years, and its morning extends for two hundred years and its evening also for two hundred. The duration of the Kali yuga is one thousand years, and its morning extends for one hundred years, and its evening for one hundred.[873] These periods always sustain the never-ending and eternal worlds. They who are conversant with Brahma, O child, regard this as Immutable Brahma. In the Krita age all the duties exists in their entirety, along with Truth. No knowledge or object came to men of that age through unrighteous or forbidden means.[874] In the other yugas, duty, ordained in the Vedas, is seen to gradually decline by a quarter in each. Sinfulness grows in consequence of theft, untruth, and deception. In the Krita age, all persons are free from disease and crowned with success in respect of all their objects, and all live for four hundred years. In the Treta, the period of life decreases by a quarter. It has also been heard by us that, in the succeeding yugas, the words of the Vedas, the periods of life, the blessings (uttered by Brahmanas), and the fruits of Vedic rites, all decrease gradually.
The duties set down for the Krita yuga are of one kind. Those for the Treta are otherwise. Those for the Dwapara are different. And those for the Kali are otherwise. This is in accordance with that decline that marks every succeeding yuga. In the Krita, Penance occupies the foremost place. In the Treta, Knowledge is foremost. In the Dwapara, Sacrifice has been said to be the foremost, In the Kali yuga, only Gift is the one thing that has been laid down. The learned say that these twelve thousand years (of the deities) constitute what is called a yuga. A thousand such yugas compose a single day of Brahman.[875] The same is the duration of Brahman’s night. With the commencement of Brahman’s day the universe begins to start into life. During the period of universal dissolution the Creator sleeps, having recourse to yoga-meditation. When the period of slumber expires, He awakes. That then which is Brahman’s day extends for a thousand such yugas. His nights also extends for a thousand similar yugas. They who know this are said to know the day and the night. On the expiry of His night, Brahman, waking up, modifies the indestructible chit by causing it to be overlaid with Avidya. He then causes Consciousness to spring up, whence proceeds Mind which is identical with the Manifest.'”[876]
SECTION CCXXXII
“Vyasa said, ‘Brahma is the effulgent seed from which, existing as it does by itself, hath sprung the whole universe consisting of two kinds of being, viz., the mobile and the immobile.[877] At the dawn of His day, waking up. He creates with the help of Avidya this universe. At first springs up that which is called Mahat. That Mahat is speedily transformed into Mind which is the soul of the Manifest.[878] Overwhelming the Chit, which is effulgent, with Avidya, Mind creates seven great beings.[879] Urged by the desire of creating, Mind, which is far-reaching, which has many courses, and which has desire and doubt for its principal indications, begins to create diverse kinds of objects by modifications of itself. First springs from it Space.
Know that its property is Sound. From Space, by modification, arises the bearer of all scents, viz., the pure and mighty Wind. It is said to possess the attribute of Touch. From Wind also, by modification, springs Light endued with effulgence. Displayed in beauty, and called also Sukram, it starts into existence, thus, possessing the attribute of Form. From Light, by modification, arises Water having Taste for its attribute. From Water springs Earth having Scent for its attribute. These are said to represent initial creation.[880]
These, one after another, acquire the attributes of the immediately preceding ones from which they have sprung. Each has not only its own special attribute but each succeeding one has the attributes of all the preceding ones. (Thus Space has only Sound for its attribute. After Space comes Wind, which has, therefore, both Sound and Touch for its attributes. From Wind comes Light or Fire, which has Sound, Touch, and Form for its attributes. From Light is Water, which has Sound, Touch, Form, and Taste for its attributes. From Water is Earth, which has Sound, Touch, Form, Taste, and Scent for its attributes). If anybody, perceiving Scent in Water, were from ignorance to say that it belongs to Water, he would fall into an error, for Scent is the attribute of Earth though it may exist in a state of attachment with Water and also Wind. These seven kinds of entities, possessing diverse kinds of energy, at first existed separately from one another. They could not create objects without all of them coming together into a state of commingling. All these great entities coming together, and commingling with one another, form the constituent parts of the body which are called limbs.[881]
In consequence of the combination of those limbs, the sum total, invested with form and having six and ten constituent parts, becomes what is called the body. (When the gross body is thus formed), the subtile Mahat, with the unexhausted residue of acts, then enters that combination called the gross body.[882] Then the original Creator of all beings, having by his Maya divided Himself, enters that subtile form for surveying or overlooking everything. And inasmuch as he is the original Creator of all beings he is on that account called the Lord of all beings.[883] It is he who creates all beings mobile and immobile. After having thus assumed the form of Brahman he creates the worlds of the gods, the Rishis, the Pitris, and men; the rivers, the seas, and the oceans, the points of the horizon, countries and provinces, hills and mountains, and large trees, human beings, Kinnaras, Rakshasas, birds, animals domestic and wild, and snakes.
Indeed, he creates both kinds of existent things, viz., those that are mobile and those that are immobile; and those that are destructible and those that are indestructible. Of these created objects each obtains those attributes which it had during the previous Creation; and each, indeed, obtains repeatedly the same attributes at every subsequent Creation. Determined in respect of character by either injuriousness or peacefulness, mildness or fierceness, righteousness or unrighteousness, truthfulness or untruthfulness, each creature, at every new creation, obtains that particular attribute which it had cherished before. It is in consequence of this that that particular attribute attaches to it. It is the Ordainer himself who attaches variety to the great entities (of Space, Earth, etc.), to the objects of the senses (such as form, etc.), and to size or bulk of existent matter, and appoints the relations of creatures with those multiform entities. Amongst men who have devoted themselves to the science of things, there are some who say that, in the production of effects, exertion is supreme.
Some learned persons say that Destiny is supreme, and some that it is Nature which is the agent. Others say that Acts flowing from (personal) exertion, and Destiny, produce effects, aided by Nature. Instead of regarding any of these as singly competent for the production of effects, they say that it is the union of all three that produces all effects. As regards this subject,[884] some say that such is the case; some, that such is not the case; some, that both of these are not the case; and some, that it is not that the reverse of both are not. These, of course, are the contentions of those that depend on Acts, with reference to objects. They however, whose vision is directed to truth regard Brahma as the cause.[885] Penance is the highest good for living creatures.
The roots of penance are tranquillity and self-restraint. By penance one obtains all things that one wishes for in one’s mind. By penance one attains to that Being who creates the universe. He who (by penance) succeeds in attaining to that Being becomes the puissant master of all beings. It is by Penance that the Rishis are enabled to read the Vedas ceaselessly. At the outset the Self-born caused those excellent Vedic sounds, that are embodiments of knowledge and that have neither beginning nor end to (spring up and) flow on (from preceptor to disciple). From those sounds have sprung all kinds of actions. The names of the Rishis, all things that have been created, the varieties of form seen in existent things, and the course of actions, have their origin in the Vedas.[886] Indeed, the Supreme Master of all beings, in the beginning, created all things from the words of the Vedas. Truly, the names of the Rishis, and all else that has been created, occur in the Vedas. Upon the expiration of his night (i.e., at the dawn of his day), the uncreate Brahman creates, from prototypes that existed before, all things which are, of course, well-made by Him.[887]
