(Prabhupada's lecture - Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 2.1.1-4 – Boston, December 22, 1969)
Dehāpatya. Dehāpatya. Deha means this body, and apatya means change of. Dehāpatya-kalatra. Kalatra means wife. Dehāpatya-kalatrādiṣu ātma-sainyeṣu. Just like a nation feels himself well-protected when the nation has got good defense measure, similarly, an ordinary man, he thinks that "If I have got strong built body and very faithful wife and nice children," dehāpatya-kalatrādiṣu, "and after this," means, "some good bank balance, some landed property, security, these things," one person accepts, "they will give me protection. Yes. They will give. I am now well-protected. I have got nice children. I have got nice wife. I have got good bank balance. I have got so many properties. So why shall I go to Kṛṣṇa conscious? I am well-protected. These boys and girls, they have no bank balance. They have no home. Therefore they should go." But they are blind. How they are blind? They are thinking that these things will give him protection. Pramatta.
Pramatta means crazy. (laughter) Crazy. By craziness he is thinking that "These things will give me protection." No. Teṣāṁ pramatto nidhanaṁ paśyann api na paśyati. Because he is crazy, he does not see to the destruction of these things although he is seeing others, that they are being destroyed every moment. "My father has died. Naturally I shall die. Naturally my sons also will die. So why I am so much anxious of protecting this family? Everyone will die." Paśyann api na paśyati. They see, but still do not see. They see daily that "I am working so hard for these things, but these things will be destroyed, as it has been destroyed previously in the history." So many empires were destroyed. The British empire destroyed, the Roman empire destroyed, the Egyptian empire destroyed, the, I mean to say, the Indian empire... Formerly..., just like Parīkṣit Mahārāja. He was the emperor of the world. So these things, paśyann api na paśyati, they see that "They cannot give me protection. When I shall be called for death..." Just like Parīkṣit Mahārāja is preparing. "At that time, all these, my soldiers, my bank balance, my good wife, my good children, my good countrymen—no. Nobody can give me any protection." Just like when you have to fly in the sky, you have to protect yourself. No other can... Take it for the birds or for the airplanes. If you are being crushed in the airplane, no other airplane can protect you. You'll have to come down from the sky. (laughter) Similarly, when death will come, none of you will be able to give me protection. Either my good state or good family or good bank balance or good this, that. No. That's all, finished. You see?