In the anipuNa paddhati of Subhashita Nivi, Vedanta Desika enumerates bad qualities which identify an undesirable person, elaborated M.K. Srinivasan, in a discourse. If a man has enjoyed the generosity of a family, but lies to them, or steals what belongs to them, then does such a person deserve any respect? A fire completely burns up the logs that are used to keep it burning. Thus, the fire destroys the very logs that were responsible for its existence. In the same way, there may be people who, forgetting the good that others have done to them, seek to destroy the very people who helped them. If they can harm someone who helped them, can they be trusted? What will they not do to others? But such ingrates, who seek to hurt others, will, one day, be destroyed themselves. Suppose there is a man, who has always been helpful towards his friend. It may happen that the friend is guilty of some wrongdoing. The man then corrects his friend, so that the latter will not err again. If, in such a case, the friend takes offence at being corrected, then he is an undesirable man. A man may be highly educated. He may be a great scholar, and the winner of many awards. But if he, taking pride in his achievements, were to belittle others and mock others, then his downfall is certain. He will end up being mocked at by the people whom he treated disrespectfully. This shows that even an accomplished man may lose his eminence through his arrogance. The leaf of the banyan tree is sacred because Vishnu rests on it after the great deluge, and because Siva rests under the banyan tree as Dakshinamurthy. But forgetting these sacred associations of the tree, if a man looks at the banyan leaves with the idea of using them to make a receptacle to hold food, then he is an ignorant man.
