Mudgalapurana 3.16: yugadharmavarṇanaṃ nāma ṣoḍaśo'dhyāyaḥ

Obeisance to the glorious Gaṇeśa!

Nara and Nārāyaṇa said: / Twelve thousand divine years, O great sage: / time consisting of the four ages is always to be known by the wise.

Four thousand years is the age / proclaimed by the name Kṛta; its junction is said to consist of eight hundred [years].

The Tretā age is proclaimed to be three thousand years; / its dawn and dusk portion is to be understood by the wise as twofold by centuries there.

Two thousand years Dvāpara is proclaimed; / its dawn and dusk portion is proclaimed to be twofold by centuries from that.

One thousand years is Kali, exceedingly terrible; / its junction too is to be understood as twofold by the wise in that way.

The centuries constituting the junction are to be known specifically; / everywhere among the measures of the ages, the first of the two grants enjoyment.

Thus those twelve thousand divine years / are stated by knowers of time to be the measure of the four ages.

The first is declared to be the Kṛta age; then Tretā is proclaimed; / then that named Dvāpara; and after that Kali is proclaimed.

Meditation is primary in the Kṛta age; sacrifice and asceticism in Tretā; / ritual worship in Dvāpara; praise is spoken of in Kali.

Dharma relating to Brahman in the Kṛta age has four feet and is eternal; / in Tretā, dharma is declared to have three feet by the best among knowers of dharma;

in Dvāpara, dharma has two feet, agreed upon in all scriptures; / in Kali, it is declared to have one foot, and even that will go to destruction at the end.

In Kṛta, knowledge is always to be worshipped; in Tretā, the sun is spoken of; / in Dvāpara, they speak of the deity Viṣṇu, and in Kali, Śambhu.

Throughout the spans of the four ages, Gaṇeśa in his primary nature / is worshipped with reverence by all mortals for the accomplishment of their respective perfections.

In Kṛta, he is proclaimed as Vināyaka, the very son of Kaśyapa, / mounted on a lion, ten-armed, declared to have the form of splendour.

[Khaṇḍa 3, Adhyāya 16, page 33] In Tretā, the god is worshipped as Mayūreśa, six-armed, / mounted on a peacock, the son of Śiva, moon-coloured.

In Dvāpara, he is mounted on a mouse, four-armed, worshipped / as Gajānana, remembered as the red-coloured son of Vareṇya.

In Kali, mounted on a horse, smoke-coloured, bearing two arms, / the saviour, knower of all states, Gaṇeśa is worshipped by people.

And he consists of the form of Brahman; therefore no difference is found. / Throughout the four ages and dharmas, he is especially the bestower of perfection.

The lifespan of humans in Kṛta is agreed to be one hundred thousand years; / in Tretā, ten thousand; but in Dvāpara, one thousand.

In the Kali age, however, [lifespan is] a hundred years; at the end, it will become less than that. / Fifteen years is considered the maximum, in due course.

In the Kṛta age, people are firmly devoted to their own dharma, all intent on the good [of others], / cherishing one another, and especially free from division.

They are not possessed of envy and the like, and are free from quarrel and such; / maintaining dharma from childhood, O brāhmaṇa, they are likewise ever full of joy.

Men constantly regard bodily pleasures of the senses as trifling. / They are always in happiness, endowed with knowledge, devoted to meditation.

Abiding in the divisions of class and stage of life, endowed with their respective practices, / endowed with faith in Brahman, they are intent on the practice of yoga.

Approaching [their wives] only in the fertile season, thus they constantly perform various duties. / Having unity in inner and outer disposition, they become enjoyers of happiness.

In the Tretā age, men are endowed with dharma lacking one quarter. / There, in their inner and outer dispositions, they are considered to possess divergent dispositions.

Likewise, their own interest and the interest of others are not equal, in particular. / Endowed with desire for sense objects, O brāhmaṇa, [they decline] little by little in due course.

Listen now to that course of the transitional period (sandhyāṃśa), O great sage: / Eight hundred years are declared for the transitional period of the Kṛta age.

And four hundred years right there at the end of the Kṛta age; / and three hundred for the Tretā age, combined with half a part.

Seven hundred years are proclaimed as the transitional period. / Day by day, in due course indeed, the dharma of the Kṛta age perishes.

The dharma of the Tretā age certainly stands there in predominance, / when the seven hundred years have passed, O best of sages.

The Tretā age prevails purely through its own inherent nature. / It should be understood thus everywhere in the transitional periods according to the succession of ages.

In the Dvāpara age, dharma has two feet; there, human beings / are intent on their own self-interest and are indeed joined with quarrel and the like.

In outward dispositions, they are considered servants of the dharmas of the virtuous; / but out of shame, O brāhmaṇa, internally they are fond of sense objects.

Out of shame before others, men practice dharma in the Dvāpara age; / endowed with desire for sense objects, all are destroyers of dharma in their own homes.

Such do they become in the Dvāpara age, tainted with impurity, / men in all dispositions; know this, O best of sages.

Om tat sat. Thus ends the sixteenth chapter, named 'Description of the Dharmas of the Ages', in the Mahodara account, in the third section of the glorious Maudgala Mahāpurāṇa, a Purāṇic Upaniṣad.

Section 3, Chapter 17, Page 34