Opening remarks
Death decries all Ideals as a vain dream, an illusion that can never be realised upon earth.
Forced unnatural flight
Earth’s human wisdom is no great-browed power,
And love no gleaming angel from the skies;
If they aspire beyond earth’s dullard air,
Arriving sunwards with frail waxen wings,
How high could reach that forced unnatural flight?
What is called as Earth’s Wisdom is not any great-browed power born of any deep profound thought. Nor is love any gleaming angel of the skies. Even if these earthly powers try to fly to the skies on wings of wax how far can they really fly in this unnatural way.
Shining dreams
But not on earth can divine wisdom reign
And not on earth can divine love be found;
Heaven-born, only in heaven can they live;
Or else there too perhaps they are shining dreams.
But the divine wisdom cannot reign on earth. Nor can the divine love be found on earth. Heaven-born it can live only in heaven. Or else perhaps they too are only shining dreams.
Is not all a dream
Nay, is not all thou art and doest a dream?
Or perhaps all including the very existence and acts of a person are nothing else but dreams.
Matter’s tricks
Thy mind and life are tricks of Matter’s force.
Our mind and life itself are tricks of the operations of Matter and its material mechanism and forces.
Illusion of the mortal heart
If thy mind seems to thee a radiant sun,
If thy life runs a swift and glorious stream,
This is the illusion of thy mortal heart
Dazzled by a ray of happiness or light.
Though the mind may seem like a radiant sun and life a glorious stream, yet these seemings are not reality but the illusion of the longing mortal heart that colours everything by a ray of happiness or light.
Children of Matter
Impotent to live by their own right divine,
Convinced of their brilliant unreality,
When their supporting ground is cut away,
These children of Matter into Matter die.
Impotent to live without the forces and operations of Matter, our mind and life get convinced of their brilliant unreality when the supporting ground of Matter is cut away, these children of Matter die in Matter itself.
Matter vanishes into Energy
Even Matter vanishes into Energy’s vague
And Energy is a motion of old Nought.
Matter itself is nothing but a condensation of Energy and what is Energy but a motion of ancient ‘Nothingness.’
Dream within a dream
How shall the Ideal’s unsubstantial hues
Be painted stiff on earth’s vermilion blur,
A dream within a dream come doubly true?
Matter itself turns out to be a dream vanishing into Energy and Energy itself is a motion of ancient Nothingness. How then shall the Ideal’s unsubstantial hues be painted stiff on earth’s vermillion blur. How can a dream within a dream come doubly true.
Will-o’-the-wisp
How shall the will-o’-the-wisp become a star?
How shall the weak ghost like flicker become a star?
Malady of the mind
The Ideal is a malady of thy mind,
A bright delirium of thy speech and thought,
A strange wine of beauty lifting thee to false sight.
According to Death, the ideal is a malady of the Mind, a bright delirium of human speech and thought. It is a strange wine of beauty lifting us to false sight.
Noble fiction
A noble fiction of thy yearnings made,
Thy human imperfection it must share:
Its forms in Nature disappoint the heart,
And never shall it find its heavenly shape
And never can it be fulfilled in Time.
Death says that the ideals that Savitri claims to hold is a noble fiction created by her imperfect human yearnings. Its manifestation in Nature is disappointing to the heart and can never find its heavenly shape that it desires. Nor can it be ever fulfilled in Time.
Soul misled
O soul misled by the splendour of thy thoughts,
O earthly creature with thy dream of heaven,
Obey, resigned and still, the earthly law.
He further addresses Savitri as a soul misled by the splendour of her thoughts, an earthly creature dreaming of heaven. He bids her to resign and obey the earthly law without any stir.
Accept, submit, suffer
Accept the brief light that falls upon thy days;
Take what thou canst of Life’s permitted joy;
Submitting to the ordeal of fate’s scourge
Suffer what thou must of toil and grief and care.
Savitri must accept the brief light that falls upon her brief days, says Death. She take only that much joy that has been permitted by Life. She must submit to the ordeal of fate’s scourge and suffer what she must of toil and grief and care.
Silencing thy passionate heart
There shall approach silencing thy passionate heart
My long calm night of everlasting sleep:
There into the hush from which thou cam’st retire.”
Ultimately the calm night of Death’s everlasting sleep shall approach her silencing her passionate heart. She would then retire into the hush from which she came.
Closing Remarks
Thus Death tries his utmost to discourage and dissuade Savitri from pursuing Satyavan any further under the stress of the Ideal.
Closing Remarks for Book Ten Canto Two
The gospel of Death sounds very much like the material scientist who takes Matter to be the sole truth. The standards of truth, as far as this gospel is concerned is the final manifestation of things upon earth in matter. And here only hard and cold practical necessities rules and not any ideal. The Ideal is merely a malady and an aberration of the Mind to escape from harsh physical realities. But the mind itself is nothing but an epiphenomenon, a byproduct of material processes and matter itself is nothing but a play of some vague Energy in Nothingness. In other words there is no reality in the idealisms of the mind which is nothing but a flight of fancy that depends upon and collapses with the collapse of matter. Even if the mind can dream of ideal things they can never be realised upon earth, says Death. He is thereby passing a pessimistic doctrine in the garb of hard facts and reality.
