Listen, O monarch, with
undivided attention to the course of conduct that was followed by the
Daitya Vritra after he became divested of all his prosperity. Depending
only upon his intelligence, he did not indulge in sorrow, in the midst of
his enemies, although he was deprived of sovereignty, O Bharata! Unto
Vritra, when in days of old he was reft of sovereignty, (his preceptor)
Usanas said, 'I hope, O Danava, that in consequence of thy defeat thou
dost not cherish any grief?'
"Vritra said, 'Without doubt, having understood, by the aid of truth and
penances, the advent and departure of all living creatures, I have ceased
to indulge in either grief or joy. Urged by Time creatures sink
helplessly in hell. Some again, the sages say, go to heaven. All these
pass their time in contentment. Passing their allotted periods in heaven
and hell, and with some portion of their merits and demerits unexhausted
(by enjoyment and suffering), they repeatedly take birth, impelled by
Time. Chained by the bonds of Desire, creatures pass through myriads of
intermediate life and fall helplessly into hell.[1347] I have seen that
creatures come and go even thus. The lesson inculcated in the Scriptures
is that one's acquisitions correspond with one's acts.[1348] Creatures
take birth as men or as intermediate animals or as gods and go to hell.
Having acted in lives, that are past in such a way as to deserve them,
all creatures, subject to the ordinances of the Destroyer, meet with
happiness and misery, the agreeable and the disagreeable.
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