849. i.e., all things are destructible instead of being eternal.

850.  The commentator explains that Hridyam means Hritstham swarupam.  By Kalyanam, of course, Moksha or Emancipation is intended.

851.  As explained in previous verses, one striving to attain Emancipation must set himself to yoga.  As a consequence of yoga, one acquires (without wishing for them) many wonderful powers.  The accomplishment of one’s objects then follows as a matter of course.

852.  The sense is this:  a wise man never regards himself as the actor; and hence never feels sorrow.  Whatever sorrow overtakes him he views unmoved and takes it as the result of what had been ordained.  Not so the foolish man.  He deems himself to be the actor and looks upon sorrow as the result of his own acts.  Hence, he cannot view it unmoved.  Sorrow, therefore, lies in one’s regarding oneself as the actor; the true view being that one instead of being an actor is only an instrument in the hands of the great Ordainer.

853.  The object of this verse is to show that right conclusions in respect of duties are very rare.

854.  This is a hard hit, The listener, viz., Indra, had violated, under circumstances of the most wicked deception, the chastity of Gautama’s spouse Ahalya.  Gautama had to punish his wife by converting her into a stone.  This punishment, however, reacted upon Gautama inasmuch as it put a stop to his loading any longer a life of domesticity.  In spite of such a dire affliction Gautama did not suffer his cheerfulness to depart from his heart.  The effect of the allusion is to tell Indra that the speaker is not like him but like Gautama, i.e., that Namuchi was not the slave of his passions but that he was the master of his senses and the how.

855.  The we here is the pronoun of dignity, applying to the speaker only and not to both the speaker and the listener.

856.  The sentence is an interrogative one.  The Burdwan translator mistakes the Meaning.  K.P.  Singha is correct.

857.  These things had not happened for many days in consequence of the wickedness of the Asuras.  With the victory of Indra. sacrifices returned. and with them universal peace.

858.  The words are Dhruvadwarabhavam.  The commentator is silent.  Probably a Himalayan Pass.  The vernacular translators think it is the region of the Pole-star that is intended.  Dhruva is a name of Brahman the Creator.  It may mean, therefore, the river as it issues out of Brahman’s loka or region.  The Pauranic myth is that issuing from the foot of Vishnu, the stream enters the Kamandalu of Brahman and thence to the earth.

859.  The reader of Lord Lytton’s works may, in this connection, be reminded of the discourse between Mejnour and the neophyte introduced to him by Zanoni, in course of their evening rambles over the ridges of the Appenines.

860.  K.P.  Singha wrongly translates this verse.