Text 27]
Bhīṣma's Passing Away
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renounced order should practice penances and austerities. Those are the general functions of all the  āśramas  or orders of life on the path of self-realization. In the  brahmacārī  life the training is sufficiently imparted to understand that the world as property belongs to the Supreme Lord, the Personality of Godhead. No one, therefore, can claim to be the proprietor of anything in the world. Therefore, in the life of a householder, which is a sort of license for sex enjoyment, one must give in charity for the service of the Lord. Everyone's energy is generated or borrowed from the reservoir of energy of the Lord; therefore, the resultant actions of such energy must be given to the Lord in the shape of transcendental loving service for Him. As the rivers draw water from the sea through the clouds and again go down to the sea, similarly our energy is borrowed from the supreme source, the Lord's energy, and it must return to the Lord. That is the perfection of our energy. The Lord, therefore, in the  Bhagavad-gītā  (Bg. 9.27) says that whatever we do, whatever we undergo as penance, whatever we sacrifice, whatever we eat or whatever we give in charity must be offered to Him (the Lord). That is the way of utilizing our borrowed energy. When our energy is utilized in that way, our energy is purified from the contamination of material inebrieties, and thus we become fit for our original natural life of service to the Lord.
Rāja-dharma  is a great science, unlike modern diplomacy for political supremacy. The kings were trained systematically to become munificent and not merely tax collectors. They were trained to perform different sacrifices only for the prosperity of the subjects. To lead the  prajās  to the attainment of salvation was a great duty of the king. The father, the spiritual master and the king are not to become irresponsible in the matter of leading their subjects to the path of ultimate liberation from birth, death, diseases and old age. When these primary duties are properly discharged, there is no need of government of the people, by the people. In modern days the people in general occupy the administration by the strength of manipulated votes, but they are never trained in the primary duties of the king, and that is also not possible for everyone. Under the circumstances the untrained administrators play havoc to make the subjects happy in all respects. On the other hand, these untrained administrators gradually become rogues and thieves and increase the taxation to finance a top-heavy administration that is useless for all purposes. Actually the qualified  brāhmaṇas  are meant to give direction to the kings for proper administration in terms of the scriptures like the  Manu-saṁhitā  and  Dharma-śāstras  of Parāśara. A typical king is the ideal of the people in general, and if the king is pious, religious, chivalrous and munificent, the