the bench of the chariot."

"Well," I asked after a short pause, during which the Hindu kept his
eyes fixed in contemplation on the spire of the temple, "what did
Krishna have to say to that?"

"He instructed Arjuna, and said many wise things. I will tell you
some of them, here and there, as they are scattered through the
holy _Bhagavad-Gitá_: Then between the two armies, Krishna, smiling,
addressed these words to him, thus downcast:

"'Thou hast grieved for those who need not be grieved for, yet thou
utterest words of wisdom. The wise grieve not for dead or living. But
never at any period did I or thou or these kings of men not exist, nor
shall any of us at any time henceforward cease to exist. There is no
existence for what does not exist, nor is there any non-existence for
what exists.... These finite bodies have been said to belong to an
eternal, indestructible and infinite spirit.... He who believes that
this spirit can kill, and he who thinks that it can be killed--both of
these are mistaken. It neither kills nor is killed. It is born, and
it does not die.... Unborn, changeless, eternal both as to future and
past time, it is not slain when the body is killed.... As the soul
in this body undergoes the changes of childhood, prime and age, so it
obtains a new body hereafter.... As a man abandons worn-out clothes
and take other new ones, so does the soul quit worn-out bodies and
enter other new ones. Weapons cannot cleave it, fire cannot burn
it, nor can water wet it, nor can wind dry it. It is impenetrable,
incombustible, incapable of moistening and of drying. It is constant;
it can go everywhere; it is firm, immovable and eternal. And even
if thou deem it born with the body and dying with the body, still,