Text 10
ārabhya saptamān māsāl
labdha-bodho ’pi vepitaḥ
naikatrāste sūti-vātair
viṣṭhā-bhūr iva sodaraḥ
ārabhya — beginning; saptamāt māsāt — from the seventh month; labdha-bodhaḥ — endowed with consciousness; api — although; vepitaḥ — tossed; na — not; ekatra — in one place; āste — he remains; sūti-vātaiḥ — by the winds for childbirth; viṣṭhā-bhūḥ — the worm; iva — like; sa-udaraḥ — born of the same womb.
Thus endowed with the development of consciousness from the seventh month after his conception, the child is tossed downward by the airs that press the embryo during the weeks preceding delivery. Like the worms born of the same filthy abdominal cavity, he cannot remain in one place.
At the end of the seventh month the child is moved by the bodily air and does not remain in the same place, for the entire uterine system becomes slackened before delivery. The worms have been described here as sodara. Sodara means “born of the same mother.” Since the child is born from the womb of the mother and the worms are also born of fermentation within the womb of the same mother, under the circumstances the child and the worms are actually brothers. We are very anxious to establish universal brotherhood among human beings, but we should take into consideration that even the worms are our brothers, what to speak of other living entities. Therefore, we should be concerned about all living entities.