Shloka 6.83.16
त्र्यशीतितमः सर्गः (Sarga 83) — Hanumān Reports Sītā’s ‘Slaying’; Rāma Collapses; Lakṣmaṇa’s Counter-Discourse on Dharma and Artha
यथैवस्थावरंव्यक्तंजङ्गमं न तथाविधम् ।नायमर्थस्तथायुक्तस्त्वद्विधो न विपद्यते ।।6.83.16।।
bhūtānāṃ sthāvarāṇāṃ ca jaṅgamānāṃ ca darśanam |
yathāsti na tathā dharmas tena nāstīti me matiḥ ||6.83.15||
We behold beings, both immobile and moving, experiencing happiness as they are; therefore, in my view, dharma is not the determining cause of such happiness.
"Just as inanimate beings which are seen happy and animate are also seen in the same manner, in which case that righteousness alone prospers is not there (for a person like you would not suffer). Knowing this you should not suffer."
The verse raises a challenge to dharma: it argues from worldly observation that happiness appears irrespective of moral order, questioning dharma as a causal principle.
Amid the war, a speaker advances a materialist/skeptical argument to unsettle confidence in moral causality (dharma → reward).
Not a virtue but an intellectual posture: skepticism that tests the protagonists’ commitment to dharma and satya under pressure.