of action.  Accomplishing acts good or bad, all embodied creatures attain to the fruits thereof.  In consequence of their own acts, creatures acquire even here superior or inferior enjoyments.  Doers of evil deeds here, in consequence of those acts of theirs, attain to Hell.  This condition of sinking with head downwards, in which creatures are cooked, is one of great misery.  It is such that a rescue therefrom is exceedingly difficult.  Indeed; one should strive hard for saving oneself from this misery.  Those regions where creatures dwell when they ascend from this world I shall now declare truly.  Do thou listen to me with attention.  By listening to what I say, thou shalt attain to firmness of understanding and a clear apprehension of (good and bad) acts.  Know that even those are the regions of all creatures of righteous deeds, viz., the stellar worlds that shine in the firmament, the lunar disc, and the solar disc as well that shines in the universe in its own light.  Upon the exhaustion, again, of their merits, they fall away from those regions repeatedly.  There, in Heaven itself, is distinction of inferior, superior, and middling felicity.  There, in Heaven itself, is discontent at sight of prosperity more blazing than one’s own.  Even these are the goals which I have mentioned in detail.  I shall, after this, discourse to you on the attainment by Jiva of the condition of residence in the womb.  Do thou hear me, with concentrated attention, O regenerate one, as I speak to thee!’

SECTION XVIII

“—­The Brahmana said, ’The acts, good and bad, that a Jiva does are not subject to destruction.  Upon attainment of body after body, those acts produce fruits corresponding with them.[16] As a fruit-bearing tree, when the season comes of productivity, yields a large quantity of fruit, similarly merit, achieved with a pure heart, yields a large crop (of felicity).  After the same fashion, sin, done with a sinful heart, produces a large crop of misery.  The Soul (or Jiva), placing the mind ahead, addresses himself to action.  Hear then how Jiva, equipt with all his acts and overwhelmed with lust and wrath, enters the womb.  The vital seed, mixed with blood, enters the womb of females and becomes the field (of Jiva), good or bad, born of (his) acts.  In consequence of his subtlety and the condition of being unmanifest, Jiva does not become attached to anything even after attaining to a body.  Therefore, he is called Eternal Brahman.[17] That (viz., Jiva or Brahman) is the seed of all creatures.  It is in consequence of Him that living creatures live.  That Jiva, entering all the limbs of the foetus part by part, accepting the attribute of mind, and residing within all the regions that belong to Prana, supports (life).  In consequence of this, the foetus becoming endued with mind begins to move its limbs.[18] As liquified iron, poured (into a mould), takes the form of the mould, know that the entrance of Jiva into the foetus