Verse 57

⁵¹If people are the cause of pleasure and pain, what has the self to do with it? Those two belong to what is of earth. If a man bites his tongue with his own teeth, whom is he to be angry with for the pain? ⁵²If the gods are the cause of pain, what has the self to do with it? Those two belong to what changes. If one limb is struck by another limb, whom is the man to be angry with, in his own body? ⁵³If the self were the cause of pleasure and pain, what could come from anywhere else? It would be his own nature. There is nothing other than the self, and if there is, it is false. Whom is he to be angry with? There is no pleasure and no pain.

⁵⁴If the planets are the occasion of pleasure and pain, what are they to the self, which is unborn? They bear on what is born. They say the planets press upon a planet. Whom is the man to be angry with, who is other than that? ⁵⁵If work is the cause of pleasure and pain, what has the self to do with it? Work lies where the dull and the undull meet. The body has no awareness; this person is the fair-winged bird. Whom is he to be angry with? Work has no root in him. ⁵⁶If time is the cause of pleasure and pain, what has the self to do with it? He is of one substance with time. Fire does not burn fire, nor does cold chill cold. Whom is he to be angry with? The pairs do not touch what is beyond.

⁵⁷For him who is beyond what is beyond, there is no staining by the pairs from anyone, anywhere, in any way, as there would be for I-making, whose very form is the round of birth. One awake in this way is not afraid of beings.