Proclaim! (or read!) in the name of thy Lord and Cherisher, Who created- Created man, out of a (mere) clot of congealed blood: Proclaim! And thy Lord is Most Bountiful,- He Who taught (the use of) the pen,- Taught man that which he knew not.
'Now that which is that subtile essence (the root of all), in it all that exists has its self. It is the True. It is the Self, and thou, O Svetaketu, art it.'
Through zeal knowledge is gotten, through lack of zeal knowledge is lost; let a man who knows this double path of gain and loss thus place himself that knowledge may grow.
Little is known by any one but the spiritual man, / Who has in his heart a touchstone of vital truth. / The others, hovering between two opinions, / Fly towards their nest on a single wing. / Knowledge has two wings, opinion only one wing; / Opinion is weak and lopsided in its flight. …