Ancient Indian Education (Brahmanical and Buddhist) c11.s6.29

c11.s6.29

wean him away from the pursuit of Truth. Nachiketas answered Yama: "Thine be the vehicles (*vāha*), the dance and song, ephemeral things!" We have also seen how the Upanishads are always insisting that the pupil must be *śānta*, *dānta*, *uparata*, possessed of *dama*, *dāna*, *dayā*, *śraddhā*, and *satyam*, the essential virtues. Besides, the very doctrine of the One Ultimate Reality is the strongest support and foundation of morality and the social sense or feeling. As the *Bṛihadāraṇyaka* points out [ii, 4, 5], "all others are dear to us not for their sake but for our own sake. It is the love of the Self that causes love of husband, wife, son, love of all beings. Not for love of all is all dear, but for love of the Self, all is dear." Thus, as Patañjali states in his *Yoga-Sūtras* [ii, 36], spiritual life is to be built up on the basis of "these universal moral practices which are not confined to any particular people, country, time, or age". The position is thus clenched in the *Chhāndogya* [viii, 5, 1]: "Continence is the only *yajña* and the only worship (*ishṭa*) through which one can attain Brahma."