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themselves in listening to Needak's discourse on eternal bliss.
    A long flowing beard covered Needak's face. Adorning his forehead was the sign of the trident, drawn out with the earth of the Narmada. Eyes bright with knowledge, he radiated self-confidence. The sacred thread across his broad, hairy chest tapered down to his narrow waist. Below the waist he was covered with a rough fabric. Seated thus in the yogic posture of
Padmasan,
the lotus position, he spoke on for hours.
    'Logic is a perversion of the mind. Human needs and desires dictate one's reasoning; hence, directly or indirectly, they start advocating the cause of temptation. Knowledge of the Eternal Being can be attained only through inner perception, which transcends all other human faculties. Logic too is dependent on such perception. An air bubble is ephemeral,' he explained. 'Though it skims the surface, it is only a part of the mass of water. So is life merely a bubble on the ocean of the Supreme Being. A bubble such as this cannot be real. The eternal reality is
Brahman.
The cause of material consciousness is desire. Desire creates the bubble of life through this airy consciousness; and the bubble creates the ego and resultant suffering.'
    'The soul is but a fragment of the Supreme Being' he continued. 'It is a manifestation of its playful aspect. Sensory perception— pain as well as pleasure, is an illusion. When the bubble created by the air of material consciousness disappears into the water, the soul reunites with the Supreme Being. In this lies eternal joy and salvation.
    Everlasting pleasure is to be found in the rejection of ephemeral pleasure and in the pursuit of life everlasting. The path to vanquish desire is through meditation. Through meditation the barrier of material existence can be overcome and assimilation of the soul with God achieved. The body is the prison of the soul. To give attention to the body is to strengthen the prison. Those with wisdom should shun the needs of the body as this leads only to illusions. To rise above bodily needs is to find the way to salvation.'
    Ascetic Needak glanced at his audience to observe the effects of his sermon. Some devotees sat with their eyes closed as if in an effort to assimilate this knowledge. Some gazed at him intently. He looked to his left. Nuns of the hermitage sat at his side. Their bodies were spent and shorn of youth. Devoid of any hope of physical pleasure, their eager eyes stared at the ascetic from the caves of their decaying forms, as if to absorb as much of the sermon as possible by way of some consolation. Their backs were bent. Their dried-up breasts hung uselessly down to their knees. Like mango peels which have been sucked up and then discarded, their bodies appeared to be monuments to the seeming meaninglessness of human life.
    The girl Siddhi was sitting with the elderly nuns. Rigours of asceticism had lent brightness to her glowing youth. She looked like a sunflower blossoming out of common manure. Her long hair was tied up in a tight knot on top of her head. Her softly curving eyelashes were closed. Her youthful bosom was gathered up in a plantain bark, which she had tied at her back with a string. She sat, spine erect, in the yogic posture of meditation. Her shapely arms carried the holy signs of the morning's ablutions.
    Ascetic Needak could not help noticing her presence. He said, 'The most opportune time for renunciation and meditation is youth. One should realise that attachment is misleading and it is renunciation that leads to supreme happiness. To realise this one does not have to wait for the onset of old age... In old age the physical senses, losing their vitality, become incapable of experiencing even the bare pleasures of life. In such a state how can they contain the subtle knowledge which leads to salvation?' He glanced at the frail wrecks of the nuns' bodies.
    The confidence of youth surged through Needak's powerful frame. 'The time when the body radiates