Srimad-Bhagavatam: Canto 10 - Chapter 1 - Verse 35

Sanskrit:

तप: सुतप्तं किमनेन पूर्वंनिरस्तमानेन च मानदेन ।धर्मोऽथ वा सर्वजनानुकम्पयायतो भवांस्तुष्यति सर्वजीव: ॥ ३५ ॥

ITRANS:

tapaḥ sutaptaṁ kim anena pūrvaṁnirasta-mānena ca māna-denadharmo ’tha vā sarva-janānukampayāyato bhavāṁs tuṣyati sarva-jīvaḥ

Translation:

Did our husband carefully perform austerities in a previous life, with his mind free of pride and full of respect for others? Is that why You are pleased with him? Or did he in some previous existence carefully execute religious duties with compassion for all living beings, and is that why You, the life of all living beings, are now satisfied with him?

Purport:

In this regard Śrīla Prabhupāda comments in his Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Chapter Sixteen: “The Nāgapatnīs confirm that one cannot come in contact with Kṛṣṇa without having executed pious activities in devotional service in his previous lives. As Lord Caitanya advised in His Śikṣāṣṭaka, one has to execute devotional service by humbly chanting the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, thinking oneself lower than the straw in the street and not expecting honor for himself but offering all kinds of honor to others. The Nāgapatnīs were astonished that, although Kāliya had the body of a serpent as the result of grievous sinful activities, at the same time he was in contact with the Lord to the extent that the Lord’s lotus feet were touching his hoods. Certainly this was not the ordinary result of pious activities. These two contradictory facts astonished them.”