(Rāma's) Censure of childhood

Sri Rāma

1. Birth in this sea of "Samsara" is unsteady, tremulous and burdensome with loads of acitivities. In that, childhood is merely sorrow.

2. Incapacity, calamities, desires, dumbness, foolishness, covetousness, fickleness and wretchedness - childhood is spent with all these charecteristics.

3. Pique, resentment, wailing and weeping misery, fatigue, weariness - All these bind childhood like an elephant bound to a peg.

4. The kind of worries that stalk childhood are not seen in youth, old age and even in times of disease and death.

5. Wavering and fickle, the actions of children are like those of birds and animals. Their disliked and treated with contempt by everyone. Childhood is worse than death.

6. The mind of a child is vitiated and disorganised with many meaningless and ignorant desires, determinations, and imagination. Where is happinesss (under those conditions) ?

7. Again and again, a child is afraid of calamities due to water, fire and winds. Such fear is not felt even by one who is ridden with calamities.

8. A child is drawn strongly into delusion in games, in wild expectations, and in desires.

9. Childhood is full of erroneous and inconsistent actions. Controlled by elders, it is not at all peacefull and happy.

10. All kinds of faults, bad habits, inproprieties, and mental confusions crowd into childhood the way owls inhabit a deep chasm.

11. O Mahatma, people say that childhood is beautiful. Woe and contempt unto such foolish and mindless people!

12. When actions exhibit a wavering mind, how can there be pleasure in the happiest of the three worlds?

13. -14. O muni, the mind of people will be ten times fickle in childhood than in any state (of existence) of anyone.Mind is by nature fickle. Childhood is more fickle. Who can prevent this bad conjunction.

15. O mahatma, the eyes of women, the lightnings, the flowing flames, the waves - all have learnt their ficklness and whimsical charecter from the childlike mind.

16. Childhood and mind seem to be like brothers at all times and in all activities. They are always fragile and brittle, prone to breaking in a moment.

17. All mental afflictions, sorrows, and faults of people seem to feed on/ survive on childhood, the way people feel on (like parasites) a wealthy person.

18. If a child does not get newer and newer things all the time, he gets into a vicious mental mood of epilepsy.

19. With little things, a child is happy and with little things, he gets into unhappiness. Like a dog, he sports in filth.

20. A child is always with a weeping face. It is like a muddy lake. He is like a rain-drenched hot place.

21. Fear, extreme indulgence with food, dejection, desire for seeing and unseeing things, wavering mind - all these are charecteristics of childhood. There is only sorrow in that state.

22. Weak and dependant, a child is depressed if he does not get what he wants, as if his heart is broken.

23. The grief that lands on a child due to wild desires and excessive crookedness (in the effort to achieve), will not happen to anyone.

24. A child burns inside by pursuing his mental desires like a forest during summer.

25. A child sent to a school suffers vicious and fearful distresses like an elephant bound to a peg.

26. Childhood is only for a lasting grief with many desires, meaningless imaginations, sapless inclinations and ideas.

27. "I shall devour the world.I shall bring the moon to the earth" - with such foolish desires, how can childhood be happy?

28. -29. O eminent one, what is the difference between a tree and a child? Both cannot prevent cold and heat though they want it to be? A child is like a bird. Both want to fly out with open (wings) hands when fear or hunger grip them.

30. Childhood is the house of fear. At that time, a child is afraid of a teacher, parents and everyone.

31. O great muni, in childhood, mind is polluted and convulsed by many faults and defects. It is a harbinger of indescretion and unintelligence.Such childhood cannot give pleasure to anyone in this world.