An Index to the Names in the Mahabharata, with Short Explanations and a Concordance to the Bombay and Calcutta Editions and P. C. Roy's Translation c5.s3.421.3

c5.s3.421.3

nor would men have practised virtue, generation after generation, if asceticism, etc., were useless, and no one would pursue salvation (nirvāṇa), but they would live like beasts, and why should ṛṣis, gods, Rākṣasas, and Asuras, who are above human conditions (īçaraḥ), cherish virtue? He who, trusting the proofs of his own reasoning, rejects other authority or doubts religion and virtue, loses this and yonder world, and is lower than even çūdras and robbers (III, 31). Kṛṣṇa said that she did not slander religion nor disregard God (Īçvara, Prajāpati, Maheçvara); it was affliction that had extorted these words from her. She maintained that besides what a man obtains from Necessity (hatha), Fate (daiva), Accident (svabhāva), and deeds in a former life (karman) (all of which might be reduced to the last item, also called adṛçya), which God distributes, there are also things of which man himself is the cause, working through his own intelligence and exertion. It is by exertion (utthāna; the explanation of Nil. here seems to be inadmissible) that all creatures live, even Dhātṛ and Vidhātṛ, as well as the crane on the water. Those who believe only in Destiny (diṣṭa) or Necessity are both the meadest among men. On the other hand, if God was not the giver of good and bad fruits, there would not be any creature that was miserable, and all exertions would be successful. Manu himself declares that a man should act; and if he works, even if he be not successful, his debt is cancelled.