हनूमतः भेदनीतिः

As Tāra, splendid as the moon, lord of the stars, was speaking, Hanumān concluded that Aṅgada had as good as taken the kingdom. He feared that if the monkeys split, many would side with Aṅgada, and that Aṅgada, being strong, would rob Sugrīva of his throne. Tāra's words had won everyone's consent to go into the cave, and Hanumān saw that through them Sugrīva's kingdom was slipping from his hands. He knew that Vālī's son possessed the eightfold understanding, the four kinds of strength and the fourteen qualities of a king — that he was not merely strong but fit to rule, which is exactly why his opposition would be so dangerous to Sugrīva. Aṅgada was ever growing in splendour, might and prowess, like the moon waxing in beauty at the start of the bright fortnight; he was Bṛhaspati's equal in wisdom and his father's in valour, and he listened to Tāra as Indra listens to Bṛhaspati. This roll of virtues runs through Hanumān's mind, not his speech, and so it is both respect and apprehension. Yet seeing him worn out in his master's service, Hanumān, versed in every branch of learning, set about winning him over. The poet puts praise first and the stratagem after: policy must be applied only once one knows the strength of the one it is applied to.

Of the four means of policy — conciliation, gifts, division and force — Hanumān used the third, division, first, and with the wealth of his words he split all the monkeys away from Aṅgada. When they had all been won apart from him, he frightened Aṅgada with many fearsome words that carried the fourth means, the threat of force. First to cut off the followers and then to frighten the leader is the order the science of policy lays down. "Son of Tārā," he said, "you are surely a greater warrior than your father, and able to hold the monkey kingdom firmly as he did. But monkeys are always fickle, bull among monkeys. Parted from their wives and children, they will not put up with your orders for long. I tell you plainly to your face: they will not be won over to you — not Jāmbavān here, not Nīla, not the great monkey Suhotra, and not I. You cannot draw any of us away from Sugrīva, neither by conciliation, gifts and the rest, nor by force." Hanumān's skill shows here: first he grants Aṅgada's ability, then he shows him how alone he is, for strength without followers is useless — the essence of policy. By speaking "plainly to his face" he wins trust through frankness rather than guile.

"The wise say that even to sit still after quarrelling with someone stronger is dangerous, so a weak man who wants to protect himself should not pick a quarrel." He quotes a general maxim: a weak man who quarrels with a strong one is never safe even if he sits quietly, because enmity does not die away by itself. "As for this cave, which you think of as a mother's lap, and the talk of its being impregnable — splitting it open would be a small matter for Lakṣmaṇa's arrows. Indra did little enough to it long ago when he hurled his thunderbolt; but Lakṣmaṇa would pierce it with his sharp arrows like a cup made of leaves. And Lakṣmaṇa has many such iron shafts, as fierce to the touch as the thunderbolt and lightning, able to split even mountains." Tāra had argued in the last sarga that the cave could not be broken into; Hanumān demolishes this with the example of Indra's thunderbolt: what the thunderbolt barely scratched, Lakṣmaṇa's arrows would split with ease. So he takes away the very refuge Tāra had offered, the hope that the cave would protect them like a mother, and once the refuge is gone, the only way left is to throw themselves on Sugrīva's mercy; that is the plan behind his words.

"The moment you settle down here, scourge of your enemies, all the monkeys will make up their minds and desert you. Thinking of their sons and wives, forever anxious, hungry and worn out by hard beds, they will leave you behind. Stripped of friends and of kinsmen who wish you well, you will start in terror at a blade of grass trembling in the wind. And once you turn from your duty, there is no chance that Lakṣmaṇa's dreadful arrows, swift and irresistible, will fail to kill you." Hanumān paints for Aṅgada a picture of a life alone — hunger, fear, sleeplessness and separation from kin — and to someone who thinks death the better choice he shows a life worse than death, and so his resolve begins to weaken. Hunger, longing for wife and child and hard beds are, as experience shows, the reasons followers fall away one by one, and "leave you behind" is pointed, for desertion comes not all at once but little by little. "Turn from your duty" means turning away from Rāma's cause, and the death of such a one is certain; that is the root of the fear.

"But if you come with us and present yourself humbly, Sugrīva will in due course set you on the throne. Your uncle is a righteous king who wants your good; he is firm in his vows, pure and true to his word, and he would never destroy you. He wants to please your mother; he lives for her sake, and he has no other child. So, Aṅgada, let us go." Hanumān ties together Tārā's love for her son, Sugrīva's childlessness and the succession to the throne, and makes returning the reasonable course. His final "let us go" is not an order but a courteous request. So the approach that began with division ends with conciliation, and Hanumān's speech can be said to bring together force, division and conciliation all at once.