Epic Poetry

"And the kings of the earth with souls steeped in ignorance, and discontented with what they have, will at such a time, rob their subjects by every means in their power..., the right hand will deceive the left; and the left, the right...."

"With gentleness one defeats the gentle as well as the hard; there is nothing impossible to the gentle; therefore the gentle is the more severe."

"When the Gods deal defeat to a person, they first take his mind away, so that he sees things wrongly."

"Discontent is the root of fortune."

"Sauti then said, ‘I bow to the Primordial Being, Isana, to whom the people all make offerings, whom the multitude adores. He is the true and immortal One – Brahman, manifest, unmanifest and eternal. He both exists and appears not to. He is the Universe and also distinct from the Universe, the creator of all things, high and low, the ancient, exalted, inexhaustible One. He is Vishnu, benign and benignity personified, worthy of all worship, pure, perfect. He is Hari, sovereign of the faculties, the mover of all things, mobile and motionless."

"Tell me, greatest of Dvijas, what would you hear from me? Shall I recount the sacred tales of the Puranas, which tell of dharma and artha, or shall I tell you about the deeds of enlightened Rishis and of the kings of men?’ The Rishis replied, ‘The Purana that was first propounded by the great Dwaipayana. When both the Devas and the Brahmarishis had heard it, they said it was the foremost of all Itihasas, histories. It varies in both diction and divisions, has intricate and subtle meanings, logically combined and gleaned from the Vedas, and it is a most holy work. It is composed in elegant language and includes the subjects of every other book. Other Shastras elucidate this Purana, and it reflects the inmost meaning of the four Vedas. We want to listen to that Itihasa, which is also called the Bharata, the magnificent Vyasa’s holy masterwork, which dispels the fear of evil. We would hear it exactly as the Rishi Vaisampayana told it, joyously, under the direction of Dwaipayana himself, at the sarpa yagna, the snake-sacrifice of Raja Janamejaya.’"

"Sauti said, ‘I heard the diverse, sacred and marvellous tales, which Krishna Dwaipayana composed in his Mahabharata, and which Vaisampayana narrated at the sarpa yagna of the noble Rajarishi Janamejaya, the son of Parikshit, foremost among Kshatriyas. Later, I ranged the Earth, visiting many tirthas and other shrines. I journeyed to Samantapanchaka, revered by the Dvijas, where the sons of Kuru and those of Pandu fought their Great War, with all the Kshatriyas of the land fighting for one side or the other. From there, being eager to meet you, I have come into your presence. Worshipful Sages, you are all like Brahman to me. Most blessed ones, you shine in this yagnashala with the splendour of the Sun. You have finished your dhyana and have fed the holy fire."

"AUM! I bow down to Narayana and Nara, the most exalted Purusha, and to the Devi Saraswati, and utter the word Jaya. Ugrasrava is the son of Romaharshana; he is a Suta and a master of the Puranas. One day, bowing reverently, he came to the great Rishis of flinchless austerity... The Munis were eager to listen to the marvellous legends of Ugrasrava, who had come to their asrama in the forest. The holy ones welcomed him with respect. He greeted those Sages with folded hands and inquired after the evolution of their tapasya."

"dharmādarthaśca kāmaśca sa kimarthaṁ na sēvyatē"

"धर्मादर्थश्च कामश्च स किमर्थं न सेव्यते"

"There is no shelter (protection against the sun) like the mother. There is no refuge like the mother. There is no defense like the mother. There is no one so dear as the mother. p. 248"

"Twice blessed be the man that reflects long before he acts. One that reflects long before he acts is certainly possessed of great intelligence. Such a man never offends in respect of any act. p. 248"

"That person who gives unto all creatures the assurance of harmlessness obtains the merit of all sacrifices and at last wins fearlessness for himself as his reward. There is no duty superior to the duty of abstention from injuring other creatures. He of whom, O great ascetic, no creature is frightened in the least, obtains for himself fearlessness of all creatures. He of whom everybody is frightened as one is of a snake ensconced within one's (sleeping) chamber, never acquires any merit in this world or in the next. p. 236"

"Whatever fruits one enjoys by penances, by sacrifices, by practising liberality, by speaking the truth, and by paying court to wisdom, may all be had by practising the duty of harmlessness. p. 236"

"This practice of universal harmlessness hath arisen even thus. One may follow it by every means in one's power... It is sure to lead also to prosperity and heaven. In consequence of their ability to dispel the fears of others, men possessed of wealth and followers are regarded as foremost by the learned. They that are for ordinary happiness practise this duty of universal harmlessness for the sake of fame; while they that are truly skilled, practise the same for the sake of attaining to Brahma. p. 236"

"Tuladhara said, 'O Jajali, I know morality, which is eternal, with all its mysteries. It is nothing else than that ancient morality which is known to all, and which consists of universal friendliness, and is fraught with beneficence to all creatures. That mode of living which is founded upon a total harmlessness towards all creatures or (in case of actual necessity) upon a minimum of such harm, is the highest morality. p. 234"

"Threefold is this way to hell, ruinous to the self, lust, anger, and likewise [[Greed|avarice]]; therefore one should abandon this triad. Released from these three ways to darkness, O son of Kuntî! a man works out his own welfare, and then proceeds to the highest goal."

"Honoured (only) by themselves, void of humility, and full of the pride and frenzy of wealth, these calumniators (of the virtuous) perform sacrifices, which are sacrifices only in name, with ostentatiousness and against prescribed rules; indulging (their) vanity, brute force, arrogance, lust, and anger; and hating me in their own bodies and in those of others. These enemies, ferocious, meanest of men, and unholy, I continually hurl down, to these worlds, only into demoniac wombs. Coming into demoniac wombs, deluded in every birth, they go down to the vilest state, O son of Kuntî! without ever coming to me."

"Entertaining insatiable desire, full of vanity, ostentatiousness, and frenzy, they adopt false notions through delusion, and engage in unholy observances. Indulging in boundless thoughts ending with death, given up to the enjoyment of objects of desire, being resolved that that is all, bound down by nets of hopes in hundreds, given up to anger and desire, they wish to obtain heaps of wealth unfairly for enjoying objects of desire. p. 116"

"Freedom from fear, purity of heart, perseverance in (pursuit of) knowledge and abstraction of mind, gifts, self-restraint, and sacrifice, study of the Vedas, penance, straightforwardness, harmlessness, truth, freedom from anger, renunciation, tranquillity, freedom from the habit of backbiting, compassion for (all) beings, freedom from avarice, gentleness, modesty, absence of vain activity, noblemindedness, forgiveness, courage, purity, freedom from a desire to injure others, absence of vanity, (these), O descendant of Bharata! are his who is born to godlike endowments. Ostentatiousness, pride, vanity, anger, and also harshness and ignorance (are) his, O son of Prithâ! who is born to demoniac endowments. Godlike endowments are deemed to be (means) for final emancipation, demoniac for bondage. p. 115"

"सृगालोऽपि वने कर्ण शशैः परिवृतो वसन् । मन्यते सिंहमात्मानं यावत्सिंहन पश्यति ॥"

"यथा च स्वगृहस्थः श्वा व्याघ्रं वनगतं भषेत् । तथा त्वं भषसे कर्ण नरव्याघ्रं धनंजयम् ॥"

"Once war has been undertaken, no peace is made by pretending there is no war."

"Do not do to another what is disagreeable to yourself: this is the summary Law."

"Senses out of control suffice to bring one to grief, as untrained and disobedient horses bring a driver to grief on the road. A fool who, guided by his senses, sees profit arising from the unprofitable and the unprofitable from profit mistakes misery for happiness."

"A chariot, king, is a person's body: The soul is the driver, the senses his horses; Undistracted by his fine horses a driver Who is skilled rides happily, if they are trained."

"People are plagued by their senses if they act without restraint to attain their desires. ... If one is dragged along as the victim of his natural five senses, his adversities wax like the moon in the bright fortnight."

"The intoxication with power is worse than drunkenness with liquor and such, for he who is drunk with power does not come to his senses before he falls."

"The poor always eat better: hunger sweetens their dishes, and that is rare among the rich. It is generally found in the world that the rich have no appetite, but the poor, O Indra of kings, digest even wood."

"अक्रोधेन जयेत्क्रोधमसाधुं साधुना जयेत् । जयेत्कदर्यं दानेन जयेत्सत्येन चानृतम् ॥"

"निर्वनो वध्यते व्याघ्रो निर्व्याघ्रं छिद्यते वनम् ।तस्माद्व्याघ्रो वनं रक्षेद्वनं व्याघ्रं च पालयेत् ॥"

"It is precisely due to the lack of the knowledge of cultural subtleties on the part of the mere textual scholars…that their analyses sound worthless and useless to us. A profound literature like the Mahābhārata must essentially be understood by being firmly grounded in the Sanātana-dharma of Bhārata."

"In the Mahabharata, the ceremony for the oath of a new king includes the admonition: 'Be like a garland-maker, O king, and not like a charcoal burner.' The garland symbolizes social coherence; it is a metaphor for dharmic diversity in which flowers of many colors and forms are strung harmoniously for the most pleasing effect. In contrast, the charcoal burner is a metaphor for the brute-force reduction of diversity into homogeneity, where diverse living substances are transformed into uniformly lifeless ashes."

"A Hindu scholar has rated the Mahabharata as “the greatest work of imagination that Asia has produced”; and Sir Charles Eliot has called it “a greater poem than the Iliad”. ... Upon this theme of love and battle a thousand interpolations have been hung. The god Krishna interrupts the slaughter for a canto to discourse on the nobility of war and Krishna; the dying Bhishma postpones his death to expound the laws of caste, bequest, marriage, gifts and funeral rites, to explain the philosophy of the Sankhya and the Upanishads, to narrate a mass of legends, traditions and myths, and to lecture Yudishthira at great length on the duties of a king; dusty stretches of genealogy and geography, of theology and metaphysics, separate the oases of drama and action; fables and fairy-tales, love-stories and lives of the saints contribute to give the Mahabharata a formlessness worse, and a body of thought richer, than can be found in either the Iliad or the Odyssey."

"The unknown author of this poem shows a bold hand in drawing characters, a deep and passionate feeling, a sense of just proportion, and a plastic power in moulding the rude materials of the old German language into metrical forms of considerable beauty and melody. The gigantic figures of the chivalrous heroic age are set before us in all their majestic proportions; their passions are delineated with a tremendous strength of expression; and their superhuman deeds are told with a confidence equal to that of Homer, when he chants the resistless prowess of the godlike Achilles."

"The Nibelungen Song, though based on the bottomless foundations of Spirit, and not unvisited of skyey messengers, is a real, rounded, habitable Earth, where we find firm footing, and the wondrous and the common live amicably together. Perhaps it would be difficult to find any Poet of ancient or modern times, who in this trying problem has steered his way with greater delicacy and success."

"Was aber Lebendigkeit und Gegenwart der Darstellung, dann die Größe der Leidenschaften [und] Charaktere…darf sich das Lied der Nibelungen kühnlich mit der Ilias messen."

"The world's best heroic epic bar one."

"Hochgelahrter, lieber getreuer. Ihr urtheilt, viel zu vortheilhaft, von denen Gedichten, aus dem 12., 13., 14. Seculo, deren Druck ihr befördert habet, und zur Bereicherung der Teutschen Sprache, so brauchbar haltet. Meiner Einsicht nach, sind solche, nicht einen Schuß Pulver werth; und verdienten nicht, aus dem Staube der Vergessenheit, gezogen zu werden. In meiner Bücher-Sammlung wenigstens, würde Ich, dergleichen elendes Zeug, nicht dulten; sondern herausschmeißen. Das Mir davon eingesandte Exemplar mag dahero sein Schicksal, in der dortigen großen Bibliothec, abwarten. Viele Nachfrage verspricht aber solchem nicht; Euer sonst gnädiger König Frch. Potsdam, d. 22. Februar 1784."

"Der Nibelungen Lied könnte die deutsche Ilias werden."

"Ine kan iu niht bescheiden, waz sider da geschach: Wan ritte runde vrouwen weinen man da sach, dar zuo die edeln knehte, ir lieben friunde tot. Hie hat daz maere ein ende: daz ist der Nibelunge not."

"Des todes waffen ie ce sere sneit."

"wi sêre si daz rach an ir naehsten mâgen, die in sluogen sint! durch sîn eines sterben starp vil maneger muoter kint."

"In disen hohen eren trovmte chriemhilde wie si zvge einen valchen starch scoen vnt wilde den ir zwene aren erchrvmmen daz si daz mvoste sehn ir en chvnde in dirre werlde leider nimmer geschehn."

"Vns ist in alten maeren wunders vil geseit von heleden lobebaeren von grozer arebeit von vroevden hohgeciten von weinen und von klagen von chvener recken striten muget ir nu wunder hoeren sagen."

"Thus the wise and worthy singer Sings not all his garnered wisdom; Better leave unsung some sayings Than to sing them out of season."

"There his bark he firmly anchored, Rested in his boat of copper; But be left his harp of magic, Left his songs and wisdom-sayings, To the lasting joy of Suomi."

"Thus the ancient Wainamoinen, In his copper-banded vessel, Left his tribe in Kalevala, Sailing o'er the rolling billows, Sailing through the azure vapors, Sailing through the dusk of evening, Sailing to the fiery sunset, To the higher-landed regions, To the lower verge of heaven."

"Väinämöinen, old and steadfast, Answered in the words which follow: "Yet a harp might be constructed Even of the bones of fishes, If there were a skilful workman, Who could from the bones construct it." As no craftsman there was present, And there was no skilful workman Who could make a harp of fishbones, Väinämöinen, old and steadfast, Then began the harp to fashion, And himself the work accomplished."

"Many runes the cold has told me, Many lays the rain has brought me, Other songs the winds have sung me. Many birds from many forests, Oft have sung me lays in concord Waves of sea, and ocean billows, Music from the many waters, Music from the whole creation, Oft have been my guide and master."