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33. The quivering, wavering mind,
Hard to guard, hard to check,
The sagacious one makes straight,
Like a fletcher, an arrow shaft.
34. Like a water creature
Plucked from its watery home and thrown on land,
This mind flaps;
[Fit] to discard [is] Mara’s sway.
35. Commendable is the taming
Of mind, which is hard to hold down,
Nimble, alighting wherever it wants.
Mind subdued brings ease.
36. The sagacious one may tend the mind,
Hard to be seen, extremely subtle,
Alighting wherever it wants.
The tended mind brings ease.
37. They who will restrain the mind,
Far-ranging, roaming alone,
Incorporeal, lying ahiding –
They are released from Mara’s bonds.
38. For one of unsteady mind,
Who knows not dhamma true,
Whose serenity is adrifting,
Wisdom becomes not full.
39. No fear is there for the wide-awake
Who has mind undamped
And thought unsmitten –
The wholesome and the detrimental left behind.
40. Knowing this body as a pot of clay,
Securing this mind as a citadel.
One may fight Mara with wisdom’s weapon,
Guard what has been gained – and be unattached.
41. Soon indeed
This body on the earth will lie,
Pitched aside, without consciousness,
Like a useless chip of wood.
42. What a foe may do to a foe,
Or a hater to a hater –
Far worse than that
The mind ill held may do to him.
43. Not mother, father, nor even other kinsmen,
May do that [good to him -]
Far better than that
The mind well held may do to him.