II, 4, 16

16. And on account of the permanence of this (viz. the embodied soul).

This embodied soul abides permanently in this body as the enjoyer, since it can be affected by good and evil and can experience pleasure and pain. Not so the gods; for they exist in the state of highest power and glory and cannot possibly enter, in this wretched body, into the condition of enjoyers. So scripture also says, 'Only what is good approaches him; verily evil does not approach the devas' (Bṛ. Up. I, 5. 20).--And only with the embodied soul the prāṇas are permanently connected, as it is seen that when the soul passes out &c. the prāṇas follow it. This we see from passages such as the following: 'When it passes out the prāṇa passes out after it, and when the prāṇa thus passes out all the other prāṇas pass after it' (Bṛ. Up. IV, 4, 2). Hence although there are ruling divinities of the organs, the embodied soul does not cease to be the enjoyer; for the divinities are connected with the organs only, not with the state of the soul as enjoyer.