Shloka 5.22.29
रावणस्य तर्जनं सीताया धर्मोक्तिः (Ravana’s Threats and Sita’s Dharma-Centered Reply)
स कल्पवृक्षप्रतिमो वसन्त इव मूर्तिमान्।श्मशानचैत्यप्रतिमो भूषितोऽपि भयङ्करः।।।।
sanniyacchati me krodhaṃ tvayi kāmaḥ samutthitaḥ |
dravato 'mārgam āsādya hayān iva susārathiḥ ||
My passion for you restrains my anger—just as a skilled charioteer checks horses that, while running fast, have strayed onto a wrong road.
He was comparable to the wish-fulfilling tree grown in heaven, a personified spring season and a memorial structure raised on the cremation ground. He looked frightening even though well-adorned.
It indirectly highlights the need for self-control: powerful impulses (desire or anger) must be governed like horses by a charioteer. However, in context Rāvaṇa’s ‘restraint’ is not dharmic; it serves an adharma-driven obsession rather than righteousness.
In Aśoka-vana, Rāvaṇa addresses Sītā, attempting to sway her; he claims his desire for her checks his anger even as she resists him.
The verse uses the ideal of restraint (dama/saṃyama) as an image, though it is spoken by Rāvaṇa and thus functions as rhetorical persuasion rather than genuine virtue.