Chapter 16: Pleasure

Those who indulge in vanity and pleasure rather than meditation will eventually envy those who have disciplined themselves through meditative practice.

The attempt to find what is pleasant and avoid what is unpleasant is itself painful; true freedom requires transcending this dualistic seeking.

Loving and hating bind one to suffering, but those who are indifferent to both love and hate are free from all fetters.

Attachment to pleasure inevitably produces both grief and fear; freedom from pleasure liberates one from these suffering states.

Like pleasure, affection generates grief and fear; the liberated person is freed from affection's constraints.

Lust similarly produces grief and fear; freedom from lust brings freedom from suffering.

Love generates both grief and fear; the person free from love escapes these emotions.

Greed produces grief and fear; freedom from greed eliminates these suffering states.

The person who possesses virtue, intelligence, justice, truthfulness, and proper conduct is beloved and respected by society.

The person in whom aspiration for Nirvana has arisen, who has mental contentment, and whose mind is free from passionate attachments, achieves the state of upward spiritual progress.

As family members and loved ones joyfully greet someone who returns home safely after a long absence, good works similarly welcome the virtuous person.

Just as kinsmen welcome a friend's return, the good deeds one has performed in life welcome and receive the virtuous person in the next world.