Vishnupurana 6.7.p3

6.7.p3

Thereupon Khandikya said:—"Do you then the foremost of those versed in contemplative devotion explain to me what that is, for in the race of the descendants of Nimi you are best acquainted with the sacred writings in which it is taught". Whereto Kesidhwaja replied: "Hear the account of the nature of contemplative devotion, which I am imparting to you and by perfection in which the sage attains resolution into Brahma and never suffers birth again. The mind of man is the cause both of his bondage and his liberation its addiction to the objects of sense is the means of his bondage; its separation from objects of sense is the means of his liberation. The sage, who is capable of discriminative knowledge, must therefore restrain his mind from all objects of sense and therewith meditate upon the supreme being, who is identical with spirit, in order to obtain liberation; for that supreme spirit attracts to itself him who meditates upon it, and who is of the same nature, as the lodestone attracts the iron by the virtue which is common to itself and to its products. Contemplative devotion is the union with Brahma effected by that condition of mind which has attained perfection through those exercises which complete the control of self; and he, whose contemplative devotion is characterised by the property of such absolute perfection, is in truth, O sage, expectant of final liberation from the world.