Quotes by Vatsyayana

“Kama is the enjoyment of appropriate objects by the five senses of hearing, feeling,seeing, tasting and smelling, assisted by the mind together with the soul. The ingredientin this is a peculiar contact between the organ of sense and its object, and theconsciousness of pleasure which arises from that contact is called Kama.””

“Even by day, and in a place of public resort,when her lover shows her any mark that she may have inflicted on his body, she shouldsmile at the sight of it, and turning her face as if she were going to chide him, she should show him with an angry look the marks on her own body that have been made by him.Thus if men and women act according to each other's liking, their love for each other willnot be lessened even in one hundred years.””

“A man should therefore pay regard to the place, to the time,and to the practice which is to be carried out, as also as to whether it is agreeable to hisnature and to himself, and then he may or may not practise these things according tocircumstances. But after all, these things being done secretly, and the mind of the manbeing fickle, how can it be known what any person will do at any particular time and forany particular purpose.””

“Vatsyayana moreoverthinks that in all these things connected with love, everybody should act according to thecustom of his country, and his own inclination.””

“Pleasures, being as necessary for the existence andwell being of the body as food, are equally required. They are, moreover,the results of Dharma and Artha. Pleasures are, therefore, to be followed with moderationand caution. No one refrains from cooking food because there are beggars to ask for it, orfrom sowing seed because there are deer to destroy the corn when it is grown up.””

“Thus a man practising Dharma, Artha and Kama enjoys happiness both in this world and in the world to come.””