160 Srimad-Bhagavatam [Canto 3, Ch. 5

PURPORT

Vidura was already perfect due to his unalloyed devotion to the
infallible Lord. The Lord and the living entities are all qualitatively the
same by nature, but the Lord is quantitatively much greater than any
individual living entity. He is ever infallible, whereas the living entities are
prone to fall under the illusory energy. Vidura had already surpassed the
fallible nature of the living entity in conditional life due to his being
acyuta-bhava, or legitimately absorbed in the devotional service of the
Lord. This stage of life is called acyuta-bhava-siddha, or perfection by
dint of devotional service. Anyone, therefore, who is absorbed in the
devotional service of the Lord is a liberated soul and has all admirable
qualities. The learned sage Maitreya was sitting in a solitary place on the
bank of the Ganges at Hardwar, and Vidura, who was a perfect devotee of
the Lord and possessed all good transcendental qualities, approached him
for inquiry.

TEXT 2

faax vara
AI BA Tats stat
a a: gd ard a7
feta wed a7 gd
WA FH Wa asa 2

vidura uvaca
sukhaya karmani karoti loko
na taih sukham vanyad-uparamam va
vindeta bhuyas tata eva duhkham
yad atra yuktam bhagavan vaden nah

vidurah uvaca—Sri Vidura said; sukhdya—for attaining happiness;
karmani—fruitive activities; karoti—everyone does so; lokah—in this world;
na—never; taih—by those activities; sukham—any happiness; va—or; anyat—
differently; updramam-satiation; va—either; vindeta—achieve; bhiiyah—on
the contrary; tatah—by such activities; eva—certainly; duhkham—miseries;
yat—that which; atra—under the circumstances; yuktam—right course;
bhagavan—O great one; vadet—may kindly enlighten; nah—us.

TRANSLATION

Vidura said: O great sage, in this world everyone engages in fruitive
activities to attain happiness, but they find neither satiation nor the
