If devout penances, life of celibacy, sacrifice, the study of the Vedas, charity and honesty-these were fruitless then people would not have practised virtues, generation after generation. If all the action had been fruitless a terrible confusion would have set in. Why do the Rishis, the gods the Gandharvas, the Asuras and the Rakshasas who are lords of themselves, with love practise virtues?