Markandeyapurana 28.17

28.17

śuśrūṣurnirabhimāno brahmacāryāśramaṃ vaset /
upāvṛttastatastasmāt gṛhasthāśramakāmyayā //

“When duly invested with the sacred thread, he becomes a Brahmacārin in his guru’s house, and he should dwell there. I relate his duty; hear it of me. Private study, attendance on fire, bathing, and wandering about for alms, and always eating that food after informing his guru and obtaining permission from him. He should be diligent in the guru’s business; there should he thorough evoking of his affection; and when summoned by him, he should read intently, his mind withdrawn from everything else. After acquiring one, two or all the Vedas from his guru’s mouth, he is authorized to give the guru his fee with words of eulogy. But let him enter on the gṛhastha period when desirous of the period of family life; or, by his own wish, on the vānaprastha period and on the fourth period. Or let the dvija await his decease there in the guru’s house, obedient to the guru’s son if the guru be dead, or to the guru’s disciple, if there be no son. Obedient, free from self-conceit, let him pass through the period of a Brahmacārin.

“Next when he has desisted therefrom, through desire for a gṛhastha’s status, let him then rightly marry a wife, sprung from the family of a different[1] Ṛṣi, his equal, free from sickness, not deformed, for the sake of a gṛhastha’s status. And having gained money by his own toū, let him duly please the pitṛs, gods and guests by faith; and also nourish those who resort to him, his dependants and children, and his female relatives, and the afflicted, the blind, and the outcast, the birds and the cattle,[2] to the utmost of his power with gifts of food. This is the duty of a gṛhastha; sexual intercourse also at the proper season: but he should not, to the utmost of his power, neglect the performance of the five sacrifices. And let the man himself, being zealous to the best of his power, together with his dependants, eat the remains of the food consumed by the pitṛs, the gods, the guests and paternal kinsmen.