In plain words
he said boldly. When a few days had passed like this, some friend who had lost his wife came to him; and just as his brother had spoken: ‘Ah, she was not wife to you alone; she was wife to the whole village too, and wife to me as well. The sorrow you have, I have too,’ he said. When he said this, the man who had lost his wife grew very angry. He gave him a sound thrashing. By the time the brother came home in the evening, he was aching all over, and was giving himself a good massage. ‘Dear one! If you have not even a little worldly knowledge you will meet with mishaps like this; so this is not for you. So from tomorrow, go to the fields,’ he said. If we are to move about in the world, what is called worldly knowledge is very necessary. Today we are taking in nothing but an acquaintance with books; we are not trying at all to learn when, where and how we should conduct ourselves in the affairs of the world. The moment we take some degree or other, saying we have studied something, we find we cannot even do the work at home. We cannot help our fellow men. For this there is one person who, in our system of education, lost even his natural qualities. He is Gārgya.
Gārgya went to the sage Bhāradvāja: ‘Swami! I am very poor; I am trying very hard to acquire knowledge. Be gracious and take me among your disciples,’ he prayed. In view of his earnestness and devotion, the sage went on teaching him well. But, being taught this learning day and night, he became a great scholar. He became expert in all kinds of learning: the śāstras, the Vedas, logic, grammar, literature and the rest. But as this grew, his Ahaṅkāra too went on growing. This is unnatural. All you children must know it. There is a thing called the see-saw. When one end is like this, the other is like that. Only when it is like this does it stay in proper balance and let you play on it. Now this was Gārgya's condition: as his learning grew, the Ahaṅkāra that is its opposite went on growing. As it grew, the way he came to enjoy his happiness was this: to argue and counter-argue with every scholar who came to the āśram, and defeat him; that was what he took for his delight. Bhāradvāja watched Gārgya taking his pleasure in this way. ‘Dear one! You are no longer fit to stay in this āśram. With a father's love I have taught you every kind of śāstra. Go back now to your own place, serve your parents, and lead your life in the right way,’ he said.