Rama’s words are complete. The whole chariot of dharma now stands assembled before the eyes. The turn is Vibhishana’s. A few moments ago he was filled with doubt, and what moves through him now Tulsidas sets down in a single doha.
सुनि प्रभु बचन बिभीषन हरषि गहे पद कंज।
एहि मिस मोहि उपदेसेहु राम कृपा सुख पुंज॥
Hearing the Lord’s words, Vibhishana filled with joy and took hold of his lotus feet. The feeling that surged up from within him was this. O Rama, treasury of grace and of joy, under the cover of a conversation about war you have handed me the teaching of life itself. This is Vibhishana’s surrender. No argument, no further question, only a grateful heart bowed at those feet. What began in doubt reached its fullness in the worship of those same feet.
Pause and look, and you see how artfully this whole teaching was built. Standing at the very lip of war, moments before he closes with Ravana, Rama explains to Vibhishana that the real battle is a different one. The outer war will come, certainly. And the chariot that truly carries a man to victory is made from his own virtues.
Recall the parts of that chariot once more. The wheels are valor and fortitude. The flag and banner are truth and good conduct. The horses are strength, discernment, self-control, and care for the good of others, and their reins are forgiveness, compassion, and even-mindedness. The charioteer is devotion to God. The shield is dispassion, the sword is contentment, the axe is generosity, the lance is intellect, and the bow is higher knowledge. The quiver is a pure and unshakable mind, the arrows are serenity, restraint, and discipline, and the most impenetrable armor of all is reverence for the guru and the brahmins. Most of these parts are inner ones. Very few of them are things the world can see. And the greatest point of all is that they rest upon one another. Let even one grow weak and the chariot is left incomplete.
This is why the Vibhishana Gita is as true today as it was on that battlefield. On the day you make even one of these parts within yourself a little firmer, know that you have pushed that great, all-but-unconquerable enemy, the world itself, a little further back.
Source: Tulsidas, Ramcharitmanas, Lanka Kanda