Listen, O Rama, to the nature of mind and action, for their interplay is subtle and profound. Just as whiteness is inherent in a cloth, the sense of agency resides in the mind and is known as the 'living being.' The mind cannot exist without action, just as frost cannot exist without coldness and other qualities. When the activity—the vibration—of the mind ceases, the mind itself dissolves, much like soot fades as its blackness disappears. The destruction of action is the destruction of the mind; likewise, the destruction of the mind is the absence of action. This state is attained only by those who are liberated; the unliberated never experience it. Mind and action are inseparable, like heat and fire—when either is absent, both dissolve together. Know, O Rama, that the mind is always the play of vibration, and action is nothing but vibration in form. Thus, mind and action are like attribute and substance, each depending on the other. Indeed, the mind is merely imagination, and imagination is of the nature of vibration. Action is the form shaped by that imagination, and all beings pursue its results. O Brahman, please describe in detail the form of the mind, which arises even from the resolve of the inert, and is shaped by the non-inert. The form of the mind is that which, accompanied by the power of resolve, belongs to the infinite essence of the Self—the all-powerful, the great. It stands poised between the inert and the conscious, touched by both. The mind’s nature is recognized as the certainty, "I am not the self-luminous consciousness; I am a miserable being," pervaded by conceptualization. The state that, unmoving, shines forth among beings between existence and non-existence, and has become inclined toward conceptualization, is also known as the nature of the mind. Without the power of action, which consists in conceptualization, the mind does not arise in this world, just as one without qualities cannot be called qualified. Just as heat and fire cannot exist separately, so too are mind and action, and likewise the self and mind. By its own nature as mind, through action and the law of results, with the body made of intention, it displays manifold variety. Wherever a tendency is implanted—just as a creeper is planted somewhere—that becomes the field of its fruit, and accordingly, that very thing is attained there. The vibration of the mind is called the seed of action, and then it is experienced; the various activities are its branches, like the diverse fruits of a tree. Whatever the mind pursues, those functions of the organs of action all accomplish; therefore, action is considered to be mind. Mind, intellect, ego, thought, action, imagination, transmigration, latent impressions, ignorance, effort, and memory; senses, nature, illusion, activity, and many others; the varied forms of sound and beauty—these are causes of confusion in worldly existence. By a chance conjunction, abandoning the wonder of expansion, these various modes arise in consciousness, following the objects of awareness. O Brahman, how have these various modes of consciousness, belonging to the supreme awareness, being mere imagined diverse objects, come to be established? When consciousness, which is of the nature of thought, appears tainted and arises as the form of a notion, that itself is called the state of mind. When it remains fixed in the investigation of objects, it is called intellect, capable of definite grasping. When, through false identification, it assumes existence, it is called ego—the cause of bondage in becoming. When, like a child, it abandons one thing and goes to another, giving up inquiry, it is called thought (citta). When, due to the nature of vibration, the result of vibration indicates the subtlety of action, that result is called 'action.' By a chance conjunction, whatever is imagined as desirable here, that is called imagination. When there is conviction that something seen before or unseen, or created earlier, is desired within, that is called memory. When, among the powers of objects that have been enjoyed, those that have ceased remain within, that is called residue. There exists the pure essence of the self, but a second perception is marked; since the unborn and non-existent appears, that is called ignorance. Ignorance flashes forth to destroy the self, causing forgetfulness of that state; through the web of false conceptualization, that impurity is imagined. By hearing, creating, seeing, enjoying, smelling, and reflecting, it delights Indra; thus, it is called sense organ. For all the array of visible things, in the supreme self which is unmanifest, the nature of things in the world is called nature. That which swiftly leads being into non-being and non-being into being, and brings about a multitude of distinctions between real and unreal, is called maya. By the actions of seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, smelling, and doing, it is called activity in the world, having assumed the relation of cause and effect. When consciousness, following its objects, becomes tainted and takes on the nature of manifest forms, these are its various modes of operation. When it has assumed the state of mind, departing from its natural condition, it becomes firmly established through countless independent imaginations. Consciousness, marked by the stains of sentience, following the web of dullness, and filled with divisions and distinctions, is itself agitated by its own imaginations. In the world, it is called jiva (the individual soul), it is also called mind, it is called citta (consciousness), and likewise it is called buddhi (intellect). Thus, the manifold workings of mind and consciousness, their forms and functions, are revealed, O Rama.