Sanskrit Quote : Category :: Positive things in negativity

विषादप्यमृतं ग्राह्यं अमेध्यादपि काञ्चनम्।

अमित्रादपि सद्वृत्तं स्त्रीरत्नं दुष्कुलादपि॥

English Translation of Sanskrit Quote:

Elixir of life is to be accepted even if comes from poison, a piece of gold is to be accepted even from impure. A good conduct is to be learnt even from an enemy and a good lady is to be accepted even from a bad community.

Commentary on Sanskrit Quote:

This couplet teaches us to accept good things in life, even from unexpected quarters. We, due to our negativities picked up from our childhood, categorize things with clear demarcation as good and bad, beautiful and ugly, useful and useless, wanted and unwanted and so forth. Whereas our experience teaches us that we should not make such vertical splits, we are mostly guided by our acquired negativity. Most of the times we never stop to think if we are making the right choices in our life.

It is a known fact that a serpent-venom can kill humans and animals. We also know that anti-venom serum is extracted from the snake venom. Gold is a precious metal, valued since thousands of years throughout the world for its sheen and it ductility and malleability when a bit of copper is mixed with it. Golden ornaments are an inseparable world of women. So when a golden ornament falls in a toilet pit, it is not to be ignored. No one cares where it had fallen, once it is taken from the unclean place. Likewise, we must appreciate a good quality or righteousness found even among those who hate us. Whereas we can, and are, following the first two, are we ready for this? We never accept this precept for its value.

The last one is the acceptance of a virtuous woman without caring for her birth and nobility or otherwise. An indian plagued by the caste system never goes beyond the narrow consideration of marriage alliance within his own caste. We have instances of parents disowning their children, when they married outside the caste, much against the wishes of their parents. But this ancient wisdom is much against such inhuman practice. It has humanised our society to the extent many parents are seeing the futility of demanding that their children marry within their caste and religion. Economic independence coupled with ancient wisdom has really set the stage for reformation. Let us welcome it.