e
attributes of Goodness, Passion, and Darkness, the three worlds with the
Supreme Being himself, and acts, all rest on Self-consciousness.[733] As
Time, under its own laws, always displays the phenomena of the seasons
one after another, even so one should know that Consciousness in all
creatures is the inducer of acts.[734] Tamas (from which proceeds
Consciousness) should be known as productive of delusions. It is like
Darkness and is born of Ignorance. To the three attributes of Goodness,
Passion, and Darkness are attached all the joys and sorrows (of
creatures). Listen now to those consequences that spring from the
attributes of Goodness, Passion, and Darkness. Contentment, the
satisfaction that arises from joy, certainty, intelligence, and
memory,--these are the consequences born of the attribute of Goodness. I
shall now mention the consequences of Passion and Darkness. Desire,
wrath, error, cupidity, stupefaction, fear, and fatigue, belong to the
attribute of Passion. Cheerlessness, grief, discontent, vanity, pride,
and wickedness, all belong to Darkness. Examining the gravity or
lightness of these and other faults that dwell in the Soul, one should
reflect upon each of them one after another (for ascertaining which of
them exist, which have become strong or weak, which have been driven off,
and which remain)."

"'Yudhishthira said, "What faults are abandoned by persons desirous of
Emancipation? What are those that are weakened by them? What are the
faults that come repeatedly (and are, therefore, incapable of being got
rid of)? What, again, are regarded as weak, through stupefaction (and,
therefore, as permissible)? What, indeed, are those faults upon whose
strength and weakness a wise man should reflect with the aid of
intelligence and of reasons? I have doubts upon these subjects. Discourse
to me on these, O grandsire!"

"'Bhishma said, "A person of pure Soul, by extracting all his faults by
their roots, succeeds in obtaining Emancipation. As an axe made of steel
cuts a steel chain (and accomplishing the act becomes broken itself),
after the same manner, a person of cleansed Soul, destroying all the
faults that spring from Darkness and that are born with the Soul (when it
is reborn), succeeds in dissolving his connection with the body (and
attaining Emancipation).[735] The qualities having their origin in
Passion, those that spring from Darkness, and those stainless ones
characterised by purity (viz., those in