Theragāthā (Psalms of the Brethren)

Who lov’st the day ’mid chattering crowds to spend : — Dost deem that thou this way at any time, Poor silly fool, of Ill shalt make an end? 1 (84) Agitated by the Master’s words, he settled to develop insight, and not long after attained arahantship. He then confessed anna in repeating this verse. He was reborn in this Buddha-age in the village of Nalaka as the son of a brahmin, and was a friend of Sariputta before the latter left the world. Hearing the General of the Norm preach, he too left the world, being established on the plane of insight.2 Anon he won ara¬ hantship. Thereupon, in course of teaching the bhikkhus, he confessed anna in this verse : Expert to grasp the image conjured up,3 Versed in the secret of the life detached, Practised in contemplation, clear in mind : — Well may he win to rapture unalloyed. (85) 1 Dummedha dukJchass ’ antay harisassiti pi Pali. Cy. 2 Dassanabliumiyan patitthito , a divergence from the usual phrases. 3 In the self-hypnosis of jhana. See Compendium. , p. 54. He was reborn in this Buddha-age at Kapilavatthu, in the family of a Sakiyan raja, and named Nagita. When the Exalted One was staying in that place, he preached the Lump of Sweetness discourse.1 Thereby Nagita was in¬ duced to enter the Order, whereupon he attained arahantship. Then, thrilled with rapture over the truth of the Master’s teaching and the effective guidance of the Norm, he burst out in this psalm :

Outside our Order many others be, who teach A path never, like this one, to Nibbana leading. But us the Exalted One, the blessed Master’s self Instructs as ’twere by just the palm o’ th’ hand out¬ spreading.2 (86) Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Magadha, in a brahmin’s family, and being naturally inclined to the life of a recluse, he became a Wanderer. His training ended, he wandered forth, and heard of Upatissa and Kolita (= Sariputta and Moggallana) joining the Buddha’s Order. And he thought : ‘ That methinks must be a 1 Majjliima Nikdya, 18th Sutta, outlined (at Kapilavatthu) by the Master, and expounded by Maha-Kaccana (see Ps. CCXXIX.), on the self-mastery of the arahant. This is apparently not the bhikkhu of the Kassapa clan {Dialogues, i. 193 ff. ; Ang. iii. 31, 341 ; iv. 341). Perhaps the latter was known as N. Kassapa, to distinguish. 2 The Commentary has : ‘ Our Master sayay ’—that is, sayaybhu iidnena ndtay, ‘ self-taught ’ knower by knowledge, or, ‘himself ’—urged by great compassion, teaches his own doctrine, like one who, to make sport (? vildsapattiydi), shows dmalaka- seed in the palm of his hand. Is an ancient game like morrd alluded to ?

better Order since such great sages enter it.’ And he went and heard the Master, believed, and was ordained. Soon after he lealized arahantship, and thus confessed anna : The factors of the self are throughly seen ; All bases of new being broken down. Slain utterly the cycle of rebirth. Now is there no more coming back to be.1 (87) He was reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi, in the family of a councillor, and named Ajjuna. When grown up he came into contact with the Jains, and entered their Order very young, thinking among them to win salvation.2 But finding there nothing to satisfy him,3 he met the Master, believed, entered his Order, and anon won arahant¬ ship. Mien in rapture at his attainment, he burst forth in this verse : O wonder that I found the power to draw Myself forth from the waters on dry land. Borne drifting on the awful flood I learnt To know the Truths, their truth to understand. (88) Beborn in this Buddha-age as the son of the raja of a district,5 he succeeded to his title when quite young. But 1 Cf. LX VII. 2 Lit., Ambrosia, Aviata, or Nibbana. 3 Bit., no pith or kernel, the usual metaphor for no truth or genuineness.

4 Ps. C. is by another Devasabha, 5 Mandalika-rtija. This term occurs in Vinaya Texts , iii. 47. I have no evidence of the comparative rank attaching to the title. when being awakened (buddlio) he went to hear the Master teach, he resigned his title, entered the Order, and anon won arahantship. Then joy arose in him when he reflected on the corrupting things he had put away, and he burst forth in this psalm : Transcended is the miry bog of lusts. Past doom infernal am I safely come From flood and fetter dire to liberty, And shed is every form of self conceit.1 (89) Eeborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha as the son of a brahmin, he was called Samidatta. When arrived at years of discretion, he heard of the Buddha’s puissance, and went with laymen to the Vihara to hear him. He believed and entered the Order, but from the immaturity of his. knowledge he continued for a little while without applica¬ tion. Finally, on again hearing the Master teach, he became devoted and intent, and won arahantship. Later on the bhikkhus asked him : ‘ How now, friend,, have you reached the state of the elect?’2 And he, show¬ ing the guiding efficacy of the doctrine, and his own attainment in the Norm and minor doctrines (dhammanudhamma), confessed anna in this verse :

The factors of my life well understood Stand yet a little while with severed root. Slain is the round of living aye renewed. Now is there no more coming back to be.3 (90) 1 Mdna. Nine forms are distinguished ( Vibh ., p. 889). Cf. Bud.. Psy.y p. 299, which gives the first three only. 2 TJttari-manussadhammo, or, of the ‘ supermen.’ 3 Cf. LXXX. and LXXXYII. He was reborn in this Buddha-age at Kapilavatthu, in the family of a Sakiyan raja. And because of the completeness of his gifts and fortune he became known as Paripunnaka.1 His means allowed him to enjoy at all times food of a hundred essences. But he, hearing that the Master par¬ took of mixed scraps, said : ‘ Though he be delicately bred, the Exalted One lives thus, contemplating the bliss of Nibbana. Why should we in our greed become epicures ? Let us, too, seek for that bliss of Nibbana !’ Thus agitated he renounced his home, entered the Order, and, taking his exercise of meditation on the body from the Exalted One, he in due course attained arahantship. Thereupon he burst forth into this psalm : 2 Never as ’t were some dish of hundred essences, Could I o’errate what I partook to-day,

When He, the all-seeing Gotama,3 the Buddha blest, Himself revealed to me the holy Norm. (91) He was reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi, in a brahmin’s family, and named Vijaya. When he had learnt the brahmin wisdom, he left the world as an ascetic, 1 Meaning ‘ fulfilled’ or ‘ perfected,’ with ka , agent-noun affix. 2 The metre is here not that of the usual sloka. 3 Note the frank but infrequent mention of the Master’s name, a usage not countenanced by later Buddhists. In this work it occurs eight times, in the Sisters twice (c/. Vinaya Texts, i. 228). Cf. the corresponding reticence among many Episcopalian Christians. and dwelt in the forest practising jhana. Then he heard of the Buddha’s mission and was glad, and went to salute and hear him. Thereupon he entered the Order and soon won arahantship, confessing anna in this verse : In whom the intoxicants are dried up ; Whose happiness dep)endeth not on food ; Whose range is in the Void and the Unmarked And Liberty : — as flight of birds in air So hard is it to track the trail of him.1 (92) He was reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi, as the son of an eminent person, and was named Eraka.2 He had beauty and charm, so that in all that he had to do he was in the most highly favoured position for doing it. His parents wedded him to a maiden suitable for beauty, virtue, years, and accomplishments. But anon, because it was his final life, he grew agitated at continued being, and sought

1 Intoxicants = dsava (see Ps. XLVII.). Food ( cihdro ), repre¬ sents all the four necessaries provided by the laity (food, clothing, lodging, medicine). Commentary. ‘Liberty ’ represents the Third Sign of ‘ Freedom from Hankerings,’ or Content. As an arahant, his mind dwells only on ideas and desires void of, and unmarked by, the three features — Ill, Impermanence, Soul-delusion. By ‘ trail ’ (paddy) is meant destiny — namely, rebirth. Part of this gatha, and approximately the same Commentary, occur in Dhammapada, verse 92 (Commen tary, ii. 171-173), ascribed to the Master when addressing Belatthasisa (cf. Ps. XVI.). The Commentary cited enumerates all forms of rebirth ; Dhammapala gives only ‘ destiny ’ in purgatory, and the rest. Both say only, it is as impossible to declare what is his destiny, as to say where, or how, birds will alight. 2 Eraka seems to have been a kind of plant, perhaps a grass, woven into blankets or mats ( Vinaya Texts , ii. 35, n. 3 ; Jdtaka , iii. 91 ; Sisters, lxii. 435). A town is called Eraka-grass in Majjh., i. 87 = Milinda, i. 276. Cf. also Dhp. Com., iii. 231. XCIII. E It AlvA

the Master. After hearing him teach the Norm, Eraka left the world. And the Master gave him an exercise, but for some days he remained mastered by evil thoughts. Then the Master, knowing the course of his thoughts, admonished him in a verse. And he, on hearing it, thought : ‘ Unfitly have I acted ; I, fool, that I should have continued full of bad thoughts when learning from such a Master.’ And in distress he devoted himself to gaining insight, and soon won arahantship. Thereupon he confessed anna by re¬ peating that verse : Woeful are worldly wishes, Eraka! No weal in worldly wishes, Eraka ! Whoso desireth joys of sense desireth ill. Whoso desires not joys of sense desires no ill.1 (93) Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Magadha as the son of a brahmin, he was named Mettaji.2 Grown up, he saw the evil of worldly desire, and became an ascetic dwelling in the forest. Hearing of the Buddha’s advent, and impelled by antecedent causes, he sought the Master and asked him concerning his progress and regress. The answer given convinced him that he should enter the Order, 1 The austere jejune simplicity of this gatha is not poetic, and is closely followed in the translation. Kama (worldly wishes ; joys of sense) is not easy to equate. Buddhism defines this plane of life, and animal life, and the lower heavens, too, as all ‘ sphere of Kama.’ ‘ Unregenerate desire ’ is perhaps the nearest rendering. ‘ Desire ’ alone is not correct, for there is the dhamma-chanda , or desire for higher things, also characterizing life on the Mmtivacara plane. Dr. Neumann has ‘Lust’; our word ‘lust’ is degraded by specializa¬ tion. ‘ Pleasure ’ should not be so degraded, for there is pleasure (sukha) not entailing woe.

2 Conqueror by affection. whereupon he won arahantship. And in this verse he extolled the Master : All glory to the Exalted One, Our splendid Lord, the Sakiyas’ son ! For lie the topmost height hath won, And well the Norm supreme hath shown. (9T) He was reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi, as the son of a landed proprietor named Maha-suvanna, and re¬ ceived the name of Pala.1 He was also called Pala major, because his younger brother was called Pala minor. And the parents bound the sons in domestic bonds. But the Master came to the Jeta Grove, and there Pala major heard him, and leaving his brother to manage the property entered the Order. After five years of novitiate, he went with sixty bhikkhus to perfect his studies. And they chose a woodland spot near a border village, where the villagers were lay-followers, and he, dwelling in a leaf-hut, practised the duties of a recluse. He was attacked by ophthalmia, and a doctor prescribed for him. But he did not follow the advice, and the disease grew worse. ‘ Better,’ he thought, ‘ is the allaying of the moral torments ( ltilesd ) than that of eye-disease.’ Thus he neglected the latter and worked at his insight, so that eyes and torments perished at the same time. And he became a ‘ dry-visioned ’ arahant.2

Now the village patrons asked the bhikkhus what had become of the Thera, and, hearing of his blindness, they 1 The full name means Eye-guardian, the father’s Great-golden. The story is given in somewhat ampler detail and slightly varied diction in the Dhammapada Commentary on the opening verses of that anthology. Pronounced Chakkhu-. 2 See Compendium, p. 75. ministered, to his wants full of compunction. Then those bhikkhus having also won arahantship, they proposed that they should return to SavatthI to salute the Master ; but the Thera said : ‘ I am weak and blind, and the journey is not without risk. I should hinder you. Do ye go first and salute for me the Master and the great Theras, and tell Pala minor of my state that he may send a servant to me.’ At length they consented to go, after taking leave of their patrons and providing him with a lodging. And they carried out his bidding, and Pala minor sent his nephew Palika. And the bhikkhus ordained Palika, because the road was not safe for a solitary layman. He went and announced himself to the Thera, and set out with him. Midway, near a village in the forest, a woodcutter’s wife was singing. And the novice was smitten by the sound, and, bidding his uncle wait, went and dallied with her. The Thera thought :

4 Now I heard a woman singing, and my novice stays long. Is he not evilly employed ?’ The youth returned, saying : ‘Let us go, sir.’ And the Thera said: ‘What! hast thou been vile?’ The novice at length confessed, and the Thera said : ‘ One so evil shall hold no staff for me. Get thee hence !’ ‘ But the way is perilous, and you are blind. How will you go?’ ‘Fool! even if I lie down and die, yet will I get on, but not with such as thee.’ Then he uttered this verse : All blind am I and perished are mine eyes And through the jungle’s wilderness I fare. E’en then I’ll go, and were it lying down, But not with child of evil as my mate. (95) Then the other, conscious of his evil action, weeping with outstretched arms, plunged into the forest. But the efficacy of the Thera’s virtue made Sakka’s throne hot, and the god, in the shape of a man journeying to SavatthI, took his staff and brought him that evening to SavatthI to the Jeta Grove. And Pala minor ministered to him all his days. Eeborn in this Buddha-age at Pava in the family of a Maharaja,1 he was named Khandasumana (Jasmine), because on his birthday the jasmine was in bloom.2 He heard the Exalted One while the latter was staying in Cunda’s mango grove at Pava,3 entered the Order, and acquired sixfold abhinna. Thereupon he remembered his own former births : how he had offered a plant of jasmine at the tope of Kassapa Buddha when all the plucked flowers went to form the king’s own offering ; and, discerning how this act had guided him to Nibbana now, he said this verse :

One flower in pious offering brought Did win me years on years of pleasant life In heavenly worlds ; the balance hath availed To bring me perfect peace and purity.4 (96) Beborn in this Buddha-age at the town of Boguva in a raja’s family, at his father’s death he succeeded to the title. As an absent ally of King Bimbisara, he sent him presents of jewels, pearls, and robes. The king sent him in return the life of the Buddha on a painted panel, and the Conditioned Genesis on a gold plate specially inscribed.5 6 1 See p. 10, n. 3. 2 Sumana is jasmine ; Khanda is broken, fragmentary. The jasmine is called khanda-saJchara , broken-sugar. 3 See Dialogues , ii. 137. Pronounced Chunda. 4 Lit., ‘ by the remainder am I nibbuto ’ — i.e ., ‘ I have parinibbdna of the kilesa’s,’ entire going out or quieting away of the ten kinds of moral corruption or torment. See above, LXXII., n. 6 Early historians were not over-careful in the matter of attributing civilization of their own day 'to an earlier age; nevertheless, writing When he saw these, because he had resolved under former Buddhas and because it was his last birth, he pondered on going forward and turning back, setting the order of the doctrine in his heart and growing uneasy till he came to this conclusion : ‘ Now have I seen the likeness of the Exalted One, and have learnt the order of his doctrine at the same time. Full of ill are worldly desires. What have I to do with the life in houses ?’ And he abdicated, entered the Order, and, taking his earthen bowl and followed, as was Prince Pukkusati,* 1 by a lamenting populace, he left the town and went to Rajagaha. There he dwelt in the Sabbasondika Cave, and visited the Exalted One. And learning of him, he won arahantship. Thereupon alluding to his experiences, he uttered this psalm :

Renouncing costly vessels wrought in bronze, In gold and lac, I grasped this earthen bowl. The second time was I anointed then. (97) was certainly known in India in early Buddhist days, even though the use of it might (through lack of suitable book-material) be limited to the brief contents of tablets. As to the contents written, the historical critic should bear in mind that a ministry, growing in public esteem and success for forty years, may well have seen its founder’s life and leading doctrines written and circulated, even without the printing press. 1 Tissa’s story is, indeed, so like a brief resume of the full and pleasant chronicle of the friendship between Pukkusati, king of Takkasila and Bimbisara, recorded by Buddhaghosa in the Commentary on Majjh., iii. 237 ff ., that it seems not unlikely the two accounts bifurcated out of one. Pukkusati was gored by a fierce cow on the eve of his entering the Order, and so is not inscribed among the Tlieras. Bimbisara’s gifts differ a little in either story. To Pukkusati he sent a description of the e Three Gems ’ — Buddha, Dhamma, Sangha— and on the gold plate he had inscribed various tenets, Satipatthanas, Eightfold Path, thirty-seven Wisdom Factors, but.wotf the Paticcasamuppd a. There is no commoner name in Indian literature than Tissa, but this ex-king of Boguva is not identifiable with any other of the known Tissas. The verse recurs in Ps. CCLIY.

Reborn in this Buddha-age at SavatthI in a brahmin family, he was called Abhaya. After he had heard the Master teach and had entered the Order, he went one day for alms into the village,1 and saw a woman attractively dressed. This disturbed his mental composure, so that he returned to the Vihara thinking : ‘ Looking on a visible object has corrupted me. I have done amiss.’ Thus re¬ pudiating that consciousness, he so developed insight as to win arahantship. Thereupon he reviewed his moral slip and his recovery in this verse : Sight of fair shape bewildering self-control,2 If one but heed the image sweet and dear, The heart inflamed in feeling doth o’erflow And clinging stayeth. Thus in him do grow The deadly taints 3 that bring new living near. (98) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Kapilavatthu in the family of a Sakiyan raja, he was named Uttiya.4 Come to years of discretion, he witnessed the power of the Buddha when the latter came to visit his kin,5 believed in him, and entered the Order. As a student he visited the village one day for alms, and on the way he heard a woman singing, and his concentration gave way, desire and passion arising in him. Checking himself by the power of reflection, he

1 So in XIX. and XXIX. This is clearly not the Abhaya of XXYI. 2 Sati = mindfulness, heedfulness, control of thought. 3 Asavd. Cf. verses 794 ff. ; Sarjy., iv. 73. 4 The Commentary (Br.) has both Uttiya and Uttariya. 6 See above, LXIII. entered the Vihara much agitated, and seating himself for siesta-meditation, he so developed insight that he won arahantship. Thereupon he mentioned his release from the ills of rebirth, through disgust at the corruptions, in this verse : Sound of sweet voice bewildering self-control, If one but think upon the image dear, The heart inflamed in feeling doth o’erflow And clinging stayeth. Thus in him do grow The deadly taints that bring Sapsara 1 near. (99) Eeborn in this Buddha-age at Kapilavatthu in the family of a Sakiyan raja, he was named Devasabha. When grown up he believed when he saw the Master appeasing the quarrel between Sakiyans and Koliyans,3 and was established in the Refuges. Again, he went when the Master was staying at the Banyan Park, this time entering the Order. He won arahantship, and dwelling on the bliss of his emanci¬ pation, he burst forth in rapture with this psalm : Whoso supreme endeavour doth put forth,

Whose range is in the fourfold heedfulness,4 He with fair flowers of Liberty enwreathed, Sane and immune, will reach the perfect peace.5 (100) Thus the Thera confessed anna. 1 Pronounced Sangsara, ‘ continual going ’ ; the stream or cycle o rebirth, new life and death. 3 See Kunala-Jataka, Introduction, Jdtaka, v. 450, and above, LXXIX. 4 See Compendium, p. 179 ; Dialogues, ii. 327 ff. rv^5 Lit., will parinibbdn- ate void of dsava's. The Commentary says, perfected by both sa-upddisesa and anupddisesa Nibbana ( cf . Com - pendium, p. 153, n. 5). ‘ Sane and immune ’ is used throughout these verses to express the awkward term an-asavo. Reborn in this Buddha-age at SavatthI in a brahmin’s family, he was named Belatthakani. When after hearing the Master teach he had entered the Order, and was prac¬ tising calm and insight in a forest of Kosala, he grew very slothful and was also rough of speech. Hence he did not evoke the right state of mind for his exercises. Now the Exalted One considered his maturing insight, and stirred his heart by this admonitory verse : Though layman’s life be left, yet if the task Remain undone, the mouth harsh furrows plough, The paunch be full, the mind all slack with sloth : — Like a great hog with provender replete,

He cometh back, again, again to birth.1 (101) Then he, seeing the Master as if seated before him, was thrilled with agitation at his discourse, and establishing insight, was not long in winning arahantship. And through the divers expressions of the psalm, he declared his anna. Reborn in this Buddha-age as the son of the raja of a district,2 he was unable to maintain his country’s indepen¬ dence, and lost his throne. Wandering about the land unhappy, he saw and heard the Exalted One, entered the 1 See XVII. 2 Mandala-rdjd. See p. 83, n. 5. Order, and won arahantship. And inveighing in his psalm against worldliness, he thus in divers ways confessed anna : By vain conceits deluded, and their minds Corrupted by the varied things of sense ; Flushed by their gains, by dearth thereof upset, They fail to win the concentrated mind. (102) Reborn in this Buddha-age at the town of Silavatl1 as the son of a councillor, he was named Bandhura.2 * And going one day on some business to Savatthi, he went with the laity to the Vihara, heard the Master, believed and entered the Order, and in due time won arahantship. Now to render service to his raja and so show his gratitude for his success, he went to Silavatl and preached the Norm to the raja, declaring to him the Four Truths. The raja became a convert, built a great Vihara in the township, calling it Sudassana, and bestowed it on the Thera with many honours and offerings.

The latter handed over everything to the Order, and going on his rounds as before, conceived the wish to go to Savatthi. The bhikkhus said : ‘ Sir, stay with us. If you lack in what you require, we will make' it good.’ He replied : 4 1 have no need, friends, of anything out of the way ; I keep going on anything I get. I am content with the savour of the Norm,’ and uttered this psalm :

Nay, ’tis not this I need, who live in bliss, Regaled by sweetest nectar of the Norm. Drinking those drops peerless, supreme, shall I F orsooth my tongue with poison now acquaint ? (103) 1 A town of the Sakiyas ( Sayy i. 117 ff.). 2 The Burmese Commentary calls him Bandhana and Sandhaya. One Singhalese MS. calls him Sandhava. Reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi in a brahmin’s family, he heard, when grown up, of the great supernormal powers of Moggallana the Great.1 And he thought : ‘ I, too, will become so gifted.’ And impelled by prior causes he entered the Order under the Exalted One, and by exercising himself in the training for calm and insight, acquired in due course sixfold abhinna. Then he, enjoy¬ ing the various forms of supernormal movement, continued to bestow favour on beings by the wonder of those acts and by the wonder of training.2 When the bhikkhus asked him : ‘ Khitaka, friend, do you employ supernormal power ?’ he uttered this verse : Buoyant in sooth my body, every pulse Throbbing in wondrous bliss and ecstasy. Even as cotton-down blown on the breeze, So floats and hovers this my body light. (104)

Reborn in this Buddha-age in the town of Kurukaccha as a brahmin’s son, he was converted by the preaching of Pacchabhu, the great Thera,3 and entered the Order. Working at exercises for insight, he abode in any place where, of the four necessaries of life,4 only suitable food was hard to get ; but where such food was easily got and 1 Gf. Moggallana’s poem, CCLXIII. 2 These are the first and third of the three sorts of wonders which the Buddha claimed to know ( Dialogues , i. 277, cf. 88). The second was the ‘ wonder of manifestation ’ — i.e ., thought-reading. 3 A name not met with elsewhere. The episode may be of later date. The name itself— lit., Epigonus— is possibly significant. 4 The four necessaries (paccaya) for a bhikkhu were food, raiment, lodging, and medicine. Not too little ease nor too much comfort for the holy life is the maxim. The subject, as Dr. Neumann reminds us, is expanded in Mcijjh ., 18th Sutta. the lest difficult to find, he went away. So continuing, because he had the antecedents, and was of the nature of the Great Men,1 he expanded insight, and in due course became an arahant. Thereupon, reflecting on his attain¬ ment, he broke forth in this verse :

Where I am straitened let me never dwell,2 Let me go thence, if life too pleasant prove. Ne’er will the man with eyes to see abide Where aught may hinder in the quest supreme. (105) Reborn in this Buddha-age in the Border country as the son of a wealthy brahmin, he went to hear the Exalted One teach the Norm in the deer park at the town of Sankassa.3 Leaving the world he joined the Order, and became a reciter of the Three Pitakas,4 becoming in due course possessor of sixfold abhinna. Thereupon he thought : ‘ I have won all that a disciple may win. What if I were now to do a service to the brethren ?’ So he lectured to them and solved their difficulties. And one day he addressed them and other intelligent persons con¬ cerning himself in this verse : A hundred tokens show, a hundred marks Betray wherein the hidden meaning6 lies. Whoso hath eyes to see but one, a dullard is, Who can discern the hundred, he is wise. (106) Thus the Thera magnified before the Brethren his attain¬ ment of analytic knowledge that was so excellent. Mahdpurisajdtikatciya. This is the only instance where this ex¬ pression occurs. I do not see the special bearing of it in Malitavambha’s case. A Great Man was either a Buddha or a great emperor.

2 The tense throughout is the optative. ‘ Quest,’ or ‘ welfare ’ ( attha ). 3 Mentioned by Fa-Hien as a thriving Buddhist centre. The name exists to this day, the village being 45 miles north-east of Kaniij (Legge’s Travels of Fa-Hien, 1886). 4 Cf. LXV., n. 2. Note.— On previous page, n. 4, read 17 th Sutta. Reborn in the kingdom of Magadha in a brahmin s family, and impelled by maturity of conditions, he pre¬ ferred the religious to the household life. Seeking the Exalted One on the South Hill,1 he heard him teach the Norm, whereupon he entered the Order, and in due course became an arahant. And reflecting with joy upon his career, he broke forth in this psalm, confessing anna : I pondered well, then sought the life that lay Beyond the walls and bonds of household life. The Threefold Wisdom have I made my own, And all the Buddha’s ordinance is done.2 (107) He followed his son’s example, saying : ‘ My son left the world when he was young ; why should not I leave it ?’ So he, too, sought the Master, and in due course realized arahantship and uttered his psalm :

A hundred years was I and eke a score, When forth I went and knew my home no more. The Threefold Wisdom have I made my own, And all the Buddha’s ordinance is done. (108) Reborn in this Buddha-age in a wealthy family at SavatthI, he found faith, and entering the Order took an exercise, and joined another bhikkhu, both dwelling in the forest. Not far from where they abode, a doe in the thicket had 1 Dakkhinagiri ( Vinaya Texts , ii. 207, n. 2). 2 Ps. XXIV. 3 = Guarded by the Order. given birth to a fawn. Tending it, her love kept her from going far from it, and lacking grass and water close by she was famished. Seeing her the Thera said: 4 Ah, surely this world bound in the bonds of craving suffers sore, unable to cut them !’ And taking this feeling as a goad, he developed insight and won arahantship. There¬ upon, discerning that his companion was cherishing many wrong thoughts, he admonished him through the parable of the doe, and uttered this verse : Not yet doth he, though in retreat he dwell, Con o’er the system by that Blest One (planned) Wdio showed compassion for our highest good.

Still are his powers relaxed and uncontrolled, Like woodland doe all tender grown and weak.1 (109) Now hearing these words that bhikkhu grew agitated, and expanding insight, in due course won arahantship. Reborn in this Buddha-age in a wealthy family, in the kingdom of Kosala, he found faith in the Master when the latter accepted the gift of the Jeta Grove. Finishing his novitiate, he dwelt in the forest at the foot of the mountain. Now at the time of the rains, the clouds had emptied themselves in the crests of the hills and trees ; bushes and creepers became filled with dense foliage. Then the Thera, going forth one day from his cave, saw the loveliness of the woods and the mountains, and considered seriously : * These trees and creepers are unconscious, yet by the season’s fulfilment they have won growth. Why should not 1 This stanza is a notable example, among others, of the extra¬ ordinary difficulty attending translation in the absence of the Com¬ mentary. Lack of the simple little narrative has landed Dr. Neumann in a very different interpretation, with a strained use of the word pakatindriyo. Pdkata — asayvuta (Commentary). Cf. Milinda , ii. 72.

I who have attained a suitable season win growth by good qualities?’1 And he uttered this verse, which became his confession of anna, for he fortnwith strove and won arahantship : The trees on high by towering cloud refreshed With the new rain break forth in verdant growth. To Usabha who for detachment longs, And hath the forest sense of things,2 doth come [From this responsive spring] abundant good. (110) He was reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Magadha at the village of Jenta, as the son of the raja of a district.3 While still young, his mind, impelled by maturity of conditions, inclined to leaving the world, and he turned the matter over and wTondered what he should do. So doubting he heard the Master preach. From that day he became de¬ voted to the religious life, and entered the Order. Happily working and with swift insight, he realized arahantship ; then reflecting on his attainment and how he had been perplexed, he joyously uttered this verse: Hard is the life without the world, and hard In sooth to bear house life. Deep is the Norm ; Hard too is wealth to win. Thus difficult The choice of one or other how to live.

Behoves me bear unceasingly in mind [And see in everything] Impermanence. (Ill) 1 Cf. Keble’s autumnal pendant to this mood : ‘ Yet stay awhile and see the calm leaves float Each to its rest beneath their parent shade,' etc. 3 Mandalikarcijassa. Cf. p. 88, n. 5. Reborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha as the son of a wealthy brahmin, and because there were four Theras named Yaccha, he was called Yacchagotta.1 Come to years of discretion, and expert in brahmin learning, he, as a seeker after emancipation, found no pith in those studies, and became a wandering recluse. As such he met and questioned the Master. Satisfied with the answers, he entered the Order, and in due course acquired sixfold abhinna.2 Reflecting with joy upon his career, he uttered this psalm : The Threefold Lore is mine, and I excel In Jhana-ecstasy, adept in calm Of balanced mind. Salvation have I won, And all the Bnddha-ordinance is done. (112) Reborn in this Buddha-age as the son of a wealthy brahmin at Rajagaha and named Yaccha, he found faith when King Bimbisara conferred with the Master. And entering the Order he attained arahantship. As arahant he dwelt in the woods devoted to detachment ; hence he came to be called Woodland Yaccha (Yanavaccha). Now it happened that the Thera, in order to do a kindness to his kinsfolk, went to Rajagaha, and dwelt there a little

1 The others were called, one, Pilinda- Yaccha (IX.) and two, YanaVaccha (XIV. and CXIII.). 2 The two conversations occur in Majjh., i., 72nd and 73rd Suttas. Yacchagotta’s ordination is also mentioned, and how the Buddha tells him to proceed to the study of Calm and Insight, whereby sixfold abhihha might be acquired. Cf. Compendium , part ix. space, telling them of his mode of life. They begged him, saying : ‘ Sir, do us the kindness of dwelling in the near Vihara, and we will wait upon you.’ The Thera showed them in this verse both his love of the mountains and the life of detachment : Crags where clear waters lie, a rocky world, Haunted by black-faced apes and timid deer, Where ’neath bright blossoms run the silver streams : Those are the highlands of my heart’s delight.1 (113) This verse became the Thera’s confession of anna. Eeborn in this Buddha-age in a brahmin family at SavatthI and named Adhimutta, he became discontented at finding no pith in the brahmin wisdom, and while he was seeking to escape during his last span of life, he saw the majesty of the Buddha at the presentation of the Jeta Grove. Entering the Order, he in due course won arahantship. Thereupon he admonished those bhikkhus dwelling with him who were very corpulent, in this verse :

If ye to this gross body give such heed, Greedy its pleasures to enjoy, the while Life’s energies do ebb away, O whence Shall come perfection in the holy life ? (114) 1 The only bond between the two Yacchas seems to be their common brahmin stock and their love of nature. The poem goes to make up those ascribed to Sankicca and Kassapa the Great (CCXI., CCLXI.). Cf. also that by the Kapilavatthu Yaccha of the Woods (XIII.). It is doubtful whether the two legends do not derive from an identical source. But cf. CXII. 2 Cf. CCXLVIII., also ascribed to an Adhimutta of SavatthI. Reborn in this Buddha -age at SavatthJ in a brahmin family, and named Mahanama,1 he heard the Exalted One teaching the Norm, and gaining faith, entered the Order. Taking an exercise, he dwelt on the hill called Nesadaka. Unable to prevent the rising up of evil thoughts and desires, he exclaimed : ‘ Of what worth is life to me with this cor¬ rupted mind?’ And disgusted with himself he climbed a steep crag of the mountain, and made as if he would throw himself down, saying, ‘I will kill him,’ speaking to himself as to another and uttering this verse :

Lo thou ! how to a wretched end art come By this steep crag, this famous Hunter s Hill, Its many crests begirt by sal-tree woods, [And all its glens with tangled verdure] clothed ! (115) In the act of upbraiding himself thus, the Thera evoked insight and won arahantship. And this verse became his confession of anna. Reborn in this Buddha-age in a brahmin family at Rajagaha, he became proficient in the three Vedas. And being of the Parapara clan, he was called the Parapariyan, 1 Another instance where the Chronicle makes clear lines otherwise inexplicable. There is no hint given that this Thera (whose name means ‘Great-Name’) is identical with Maha-Nama the Sakiyan, one of the Buddha’s first (lay) converts, or with the Licchavi of Ang., iii. 76. The hill in question has not been met with in other books as yet, but, judging from the Commentary, it seems to have been a most charming resort, well supplied with shade, water, and medicinal herbs. With his desperate mood, cf. Yakkali (CCV.), Sappadasa (CCXV.), and Slha ( Sisters , Ps. xi.). and taught mantras.1 He saw the wisdom and majesty of the Master at the Rajagaha Conference, and entered the Order, in due course winning arahantship. Reflecting on his career, he broke forth in joy with this psalm :

Avoiding truck with contact’s sixfold field, Guarding the gates of sense, master of self, The general root of misery vomiting, From every poison- taint am I immune. (116) This verse became his confession of anna. Reborn in this time of our Exalted One as the son of a very wealthy councillor at Benares, he was exceedingly delicately nurtured, and had three mansions for the different seasons, all of which is told in the Khandaka.2 Impelled by antece¬ dent conditions, he saw one night the indecorum in his sleeping attendants and, greatly distressed, put on his gold slippers and left both house and town, gods opening the doors for him. So he went towards Isipatana, exclaiming : ‘ Alas ! what distress ! Alas ! what danger !’ Now at that hour the Exalted One, who was staying at Isipatana in order to do him kindness, was walking to and fro out of doors, and said : ‘ Come, Yasa, here is there neither distress nor danger.’ Yasa filled with joy put off his slippers, and sat down beside the Exalted One. The Master talked to him by a graduated discourse, and when he had finished teaching the Truths, Yrasa became a convert. And while the Exalted One taught the Truths to his father who had come to seek him, Yasa realized arahantship.

Then the Exalted One held out his right arm to Yasa, saying, ‘ CoxVE, bhikkhu!’ And at his merely saying the words, Yasa’s hair was shorn two fingers’ length, and he Vinaya Texts , i. 102 ff. 1 Cf. CCXLIX., CCLYII. was equipped with the eight necessaries.1 Reflecting on his career, he rejoiced over those words calling him to his present state, * Come, bhikkhu !’2 and uttered this psalm : With perfumed skin and delicately clad And head ablaze with gems, natheless my way I found and made the Threefold Lore my own;3 And now the Buddha-ordinance is done. (117) Reborn in this Buddha- age at Kapilavatthu in the family of a Sakiyan raja, and named Kimbila,4 he inherited im¬ mense wrealth. The Master saw the maturity of his insight while staying at Anupiya, and in order to arouse him, conjured up a beautiful woman in her prime, and showed her to him passing to old age. Then Kimbila greatly shaken uttered this verse : As bidden by some power age o’er her falls. Her shape is as another, yet the same. Now this my self, who ne’er have left myself, Seems other than the self I recollect. (118)

1 This is a mythical elaboration of the older tale in the Vinaya. In the Order the learner or pupil had to remove his shoes when waiting on his teacher { ibid ., i. 66 (62), 154). 2 Cf. Bliadda’s joy at these words, a special honour to a candidate ( Sisters , Ps. xlvi., also CCXXVI. below and others). 3 The point lies in his swift attainment, as a layman. 4 Also spelt (Br.) Kimila and Kimmila. He was converted, with five other young Sakiyan nobles, in the first week of the Buddha’s mission, according to the Vinaya narrative. There the method adopted for his conversion is not given. Kimbila is represented in the Majjhima as maintaining his early friendship with the senior Thera Anuruddha, dwelling with him, and a third, Nandiya (Ps. XXV.), now in this wood or park, now in that ( Vinaya Texts , ii. 609, iii. 228; Majjh., i. 205, iii. 155 ; see also CXXXVIII.). Anupiya was a town in the Malla republic ( Vinaya Texts , iii. 224). He thus, considering the fact of impermanence, was yet more strongly agitated, and going to the Master heard the Norm, believed, entered the Order, and in due course won arahantship. Thereupon he emphasized how he had formerly looked on things as permanent by repeating the verse, thereby confessing anna.

Reborn in this Buddha-age as the son of a Licchavi raja at Vesall, he became known as the Vajjian’s son, because his father was one of the Yajjians.1 While yet a youth and engaged in training elephants, he, inclined by fulness of cause to seek Release, went to the Yihara at the hour when the Master was to preach, and having heard, entered the Order, and in due course acquired sixfold abhihna. At a later time, shortly after the Master had passed awTay, Yajjiputta formed an agreement with the chief Theras to preserve the Dhamma intact, and travelled with them from place to place. One day he saw the Yenerable Ananda, who was still a student only, surrounded by a large con¬ gregation, teaching them the Norm. And to call forth endeavour in him to reach the higher Paths, he uttered this verse : Come thou ancl plunge in leafy lair of trees, Suffer Nibbana in thy heart to sink ! Study and dally not, thou Gotamid ! What doth this fingle-f angle mean to thee ?2 (119) 1 This is apparently not the Vajji-putta of LXII., who was not of noble rank. 2 For this late attainment of the goal by Ananda, the Buddha’s chief attendant, see Vinaya Texts, iii. 373. The verse occurs also in Sayy, i. 199, where woodland sprites note Ananda’ s preoccupation with worldly interests — a tendency that was entirely amiable in itself, and

Hearing this and speech of others, dispelling poisonous odours, Ananda grew agitated, and most of the night walked to and fro meditating. Then, with insight worked up, he entered his dwelling, and in the act of lying down on his couch, he won arahantship. Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Avanti at Velugama,* 1 as the son of a caravan guide, he became (by correspondence) the unseen friend of Citta, a house-father at Macchikasanda. The latter wrote to him on the excel¬ lence of the Buddha, and sent him a copy of the system. This so moved him that he sought ordination under the Thera Kaccana the Great. In due course he acquired six¬ fold abhinna. Thereupon he had a mind to visit the Buddha, and taking leave of the Thera, came in course of time to the Middle Country,2 and had an interview with the Master. The latter asked him the question, ‘ How goes which is noticeable in the many episodes related of him. To these other admonishers the Chronicle refers. Ananda was of the Gotama clan, cousin to the Buddha. The quaint term bilibilika is thus paraphrased vilivilikriyd (lit., sticky-sticky- action ?), the reiteration being intended as a deprecation of his preoccupation with the interests of the many to his own spiritual hindrance. For Ananda’ s psalm, see CCLX. ; cf. also CLXXV.

1 Avanti lay north of the Vindhya Mountains, north-east of Bombay. It was one of the four chief monarchies in India when Buddhism arose, and was later absorbed into the Moriyan Empire. Its capital was Ujjeni. Velugama (Bamboo-village) is not, so far, met with in other works (see Buddhist India , p. 1 ff.). Citta, whose home lay near Savatthl, was one of the most eminent lay-supporters of the Buddha. On this further instance, in the later tradition, of the doctrine being propagated by writing, cf. XCVII. On Kaccana, see CCIX. Pro¬ nounced Chitta, Kacchana. 2 The Ganges Valley (Rhys Davids, ‘The Middle Country,’ JliAS, 1904, p. 83#.). it with you, bhikkhu ? Are you prospering ?’ And he re¬ plied : ‘ Exalted One, from the time when I was admitted into your Rule, all sorrow and pain left me, all sense of peril was calmed.’ And he declared anna in making that confession, uttering this verse : The factors of my life well understood Stand yet a little while with severed root.1 Sorrow is slain ! that quest I’ve won, and won Is purity from fourfold Venom's stain.2 (120) 1 = verse 90, first half. Reborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha as the son of an eminent brahmin and named Uttara, he graduated in brahmin lore, and became renowned for his breeding, beauty, wisdom and virtue. Vassakara, a leading minister of Magadha, seeing his attainments, was desirous of marry¬ ing him to his daughter. But he with heart set on release declined, and he attended the teaching of the General of the Norm.1 Winning faith, he entered the Order and fulfilled his novitiate, waiting upon Sariputta.

Now the Thera fell ill, and Uttara set out in the morning to seek a physician. On his round he set down his bowl on the banks of a lake and went to the water to wash out his mouth. Then a certain thief, pursued by the police, escaped from the town by the chief gate, and running by, dropped his stolen jewels into the novice’s bowl, and fled. Then, as the latter came back to his bowl, the king’s men passed in pursuit, and seeing the bowl, said : 4 This is the thief ! He has done the burglary !’ And binding his arms behind, they brought him before Vassakara, the brahmin, and punished him. Then the Exalted One, contemplating the ripeness of his insight, went thither, and placing a gentle hand, like drop¬ ping of crimson gold, on Uttara’s head, spake thus : ‘ Uttara, this is the fruit of previous action. Come here to pass, it 1 Sariputta, chief of the disciples till his death. is to be accepted by thee through the power of reflection,' and so taught him the Norm according to his need. Uttara, thus ambrosially anointed by the touch of the Master’s hand, was transported with joy and rapture, and through the ripeness of his insight and the charm of his Master’s teaching, so cast off all impurity that he attained sixfold abhinna. Rising clear of the stake,1 he stood in the air, performing a miracle out of compassion for others. To the amazement of all, his wound was healed. When asked by the bhikkhus, ‘ Brother, how were you able, suffering such pain, to apply insight?’ he said, ‘Since I clearly saw, Brothers, the evil of rebirths and the nature of the con¬ ditioned, it was not the lesser evil of present pain that could hinder me from increasing insight, and achieving attainment ’ :2

There is no life that lasteth evermore, Nor permanence in things from causes come. They are reborn, the factors of our life, Thereafter they dissolve and die away. (121) Since this the evil claiming all my thought, Sooth am I one who doth not seek to be. Detached from all that worldly aims commend, Of th’ intoxicants have I now made an end.3 (122) Reborn in this Buddha-age as the son of the chaplain to king Udena of Kosambi, he was named Bharadvaja.4 1 Sulato utthahitva. He was presumably bound or impaled, or otherwise suffering punishment. 3 I.e., ‘ I have won nibbana and arahantship.’ Commentary, averse 458. 4 Bharadvaja seems to have been the name of a brahmin clan, though here given as a personal name ( S . Vibh., p. 6; Sayy., i. 160). Hence either Pindola is the personal name, or it is a soubriquet, analogous to our ‘ chunks,’ associated with his earlier greedy habits. Having learnt the three Vedas, and teaching the hymns with great success to a school of brahmin youths, the work became distasteful. And leaving them, he went to Rajagaha. Seeing there the gifts and favours bestowed on the Order of the Exalted One, he entered the same. He overcame intemperance in diet by the Teacher’s methods, and ac¬ quired sixfold abhinna.

He thereupon announced before the Exalted One that he would answer the questions of any Brethren in doubt con¬ cerning path or fruit, thus uttering his ‘lion’s roar.’* 1 Wherefore the Exalted One said of him : 4 The chief among my disciples who are lion-roarers is Pindola-Bharadvaja.’ Now there came to him a former friend, a brahmin of a miserly nature. And the Thera persuaded him to make an offering, handing it over to the Order. And because the brahmin believed the Thera was greedy and self-seeking, the latter set himself to instruct him in the privileges of religious gifts, saying : Not without rule and method must we live. But food as such is never near my heart. 4 By nutriment the body is sustained ’ :2 This do I know, and hence my quest for alms. (123) 4 A [treacherous] bog’ it is : — the wise know well : These bows and gifts and treats from wealthy folk. ’Tis like steel splinter bedded in the flesh, For foolish brethren hard to extricate.3 (124) His perfected self-mastery is the theme in TJddna, iv. 6. He is persecuted for preaching by King Udena (Jut., iv. 375), but is sub¬ sequently consulted by the latter, who reforms his ways ( Saijy ., iv. 110). He is rebuked for cheaply performing a miracle ( Vinaya Texts , iii. 78). Two untraced stanzas of his are quoted ( Milinda , ii. 335, 345).

1 The usual idiom for an affirmation of competence or readiness to act (Ang. Nik., i. 23). 2 Included in the orthodox dictum : 1 All beings are sustained by nutriment ’ ( Digha Nik., iii. 211 ; Khuddaka Pdtha). 3 See verses 495, 1053. Gf. J at aka, iv. 222 (text). Eeborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi as the son of an eminent brahmin, he was named Valliya. While adoles¬ cent and in the power of the senses, he formed virtuous friendships, whereby he came to the Exalted One, found faith and entered the Order, soon thereafter establishing insight and winning arahantship. Reflecting on the past with its worldly objects and desires, and on how, by the Ariyan Path, he now had turned from all that, he thus declared anna : Within the little five-doored hut an ape2 Doth prowl, and round and round from door to door He hies, rattling with blows again, again. (125) Halt, ape ! run thou not forth ! for thee Tis not herein as it was wont to be. Reason doth hold thee captive. Never more Shalt roam far hence [in freedom as of yore]. (120) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi as a citizen’s son, he was named Datfca.3 And when, in his domestic

1 Cf., LIII., and CXLIY. 2 Chitta (consciousness), is, in the Sayyutta Nihdya (ii.9), pictured as the restless, varying leaps of a tree-monkey. The Commentary applies this simile to the present one of the ape under control. The ape is found in Tibetan drawings of the stages of (past, present, and future) life as the symbol of vihhdna, the synonym for consciousness, or sense-cognition (see JRAS, 1894, p. 367 Apparently the Tibetan lamas had forgotten the tradition, or gave an explanation which they hnew would interest their medical interlocutor, Major Waddell, or the latter evolved a Western interpretation out of their imperfectly under¬ stood descriptions). Cf. verse 1111 in Ps. CCLXII. 3 = Donatus. His story — how he came to take his mother and his sister as his wives, not knowing his relation to either — is told in the life, he transgressed through ignorance, then discovered his offence, anguish seized him so that he left the world. Distressed at his deeds, he adopted a course of austerity, and dwelt on the bank of the Ganges, making himself a tent of palm-leaves. Hence he became known as Gangatlriya (Ganges-sider). And he resolved to speak to no one. So he kept silence for a whole year. In the second year, a woman of the village where he sought alms, wishing to find out whether he was dumb, spilt milk as she filled his bowl. And he let fall the words : ‘ Enough, sister.’ But in the third year, after strenuous effort, he won arahantship. Thereupon he declared anna by word of mouth, extolling his past procedure in these verses :

On Ganga’s shore three palm-tree leaves I took And made my hut ; my bowl like funeral pot Wherewith men sprinkle milk upon a corpse ; My cloak from refuse of the dust-heap culled.1 (127) Two years, from one rain-season till the next, I [there abode], nor spake a word save once. So till the third year passed— then the long night Of gloom asunder burst [and broke in light]. (128) Chronicle to the Sisters’ Psalms, pp. 112, 115. The allusion here to his incest is so delicately or vaguely worded that it needs the explana¬ tion afforded by the Sister-chronicle. The Pali is as follows : Ghardvasarj vasanto agamaniyatfh dinab hdvay ajdnitvd vitikkamay katvd puna dgamaniyatthdnabhdvay iiatvd. 1 On such austerities, see Vinaya Texts , iii. 89. The bowl here is not a skull ( chavaslsay ), but is described in the Commentary as . matdnay khirasecanakuycla-sadiso , ‘ like a milk- sprinkling pot for the dead ’—a sort of memento mori (cf. Neumann). It is just possible that the text was originally chavasisena me patto, as the idiom runs in the Vinaya, but such skull-bowls were forbidden. There is greater sobriety and dignity in the austerities of this Indian (Edipus than in the brutal self-mutilation of the Greek kino-

Reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi, in the family of a certain poor brahmin, he was wrapt at birth in an antelope’s skin, and was hence named Antelope (Ajina). Growing up in poverty, he saw the Jeta Grove presented, and the power and majesty of the Buddha. And gaining faith he left the world, and not long after acquired super¬ normal thought. When he had moreover won arahantship, he, in consequence of past deeds, remained unhonoured and unknowm. And some worldly novices among the bhikkhus despised him for this. Then the Thera agitated them with these verses : E'en though a man have gained the Triple Lore, Have vanquished death and purged th intoxicants, Yet, let him be to fame unknown, poor fools May in their ignorance look down on him. (129) But let him get the good things of this world, Then though he be of evil breed, natheless Service and honour will they render him. (130) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Benares, in a nobleman’s family, and named Melajina, he became distinguished for learning and accomplishments, and renowned in all the country. When the Exalted One stayed at Benares, in Isipatana, Melajina went to hear him preach the Norm ; and gaining faith, he entered the Order and won arahant¬ ship.

A.nd when the bhikkhus asked how far he had acquired supernormal qualities, he uttered a 'lion’s roar’: When I had heard the Master preach the Norm, No doubts my mind could thenceforth entertain In him all-knowing and invincible. (131) Nor in a mighty hero like to him, Lord of the caravan,1 driver of men, Peerless and grand, nor in the Path, the Rule,2 Can ever want of faith disturb my soul. (132) Reborn in the time of our Exalted One at Rajagaha, as a brahmin, he was in his old age unable to perform his various duties. Being passed over,3 he went to the Master and levealed his needs. The Master, contemplating his graduation in essential conditions, ordered Sariputta to admit him. Soon after that he won arahantship. And thereafter, keeping near the Master, he became pre-eminent among those who, deriving from the Master’s teaching,4 could speak impromptu. 1 Cf. Dialogues , ii. 82. Satthavdhe , there rendered ‘ lord of the pilgrim band,’ is here more literally reproduced. 2 Magge , patipaddyay vd—i.e., ‘the Ariyan [Eightfold] Path, and the Precepts, and so on 5 (Commentary). The verses may not seem an apposite reply; but if the Compendium of Philosophy (pp. 65, 210, 213) be consulted, it will be seen that the expulsion of all forms of doubt was held to be a very essential preliminary to transcending normal experience.

4 The passage assigning him pre-eminence is then quoted from Ang., i. 25. Cf. with "V angisa’s similar but not identical pre-eminence, Ps. CCLXIY. This Thera is possibly identical with the ‘venerable Radha ’ addressed in many short discourses of the Sayyutta (iii. 79 188 ^ ; iv. 48 /.). Now one day seeing how want of self-training occasioned governance by the passions, he exhorted thus : E’en as into an ill-roofed house the rain Doth pierce and penetrate continually, So into mind by exercise untrained Doth passion ever pierce and penetrate. (138) And as into a well-roofed house no rain Doth pierce and penetrate continually, So into mind by calm and insight trained Doth passion never pierce and penetrate.1 (134) Reborn in this Buddha-age as the younger brother of the aforesaid Radha, he followed his elder brother’s example, and became an arahant also. To show the saving guidance of the Rule, he declared anna thus : All coming back to birth is now destroyed. The Conqueror’s Rule hath guided all my ways.2 That which we call the Net have I put off ;3 The lust that leads to life is rooted out. (135) And the great quest, for which I left the world,

Forsaking home a homeless life to lead, Even that quest and high reward I’ve won, For I am he whose bonds are riven in twain.4 (136) 1 ‘ Exercise,’ ‘ calm and insight ’ — in the text blidvana — the collective name for the systematized effort in self -training of the disciple who seeks perfection (Bud. Psy p. 261, n. 2). Specified as 'calm and insight ’ in the Commentary. Cf. Compendium , p. 202 ff. 2 ‘ The holy life of the Path has been lived by me ’ (Commentary). 3 Cf. Dliaynmapada , verse 251 ; Sayjy ., iii. 83. Commentary, 4 net = error, ignorance.’ More usually it = craving, or sense. Suradha is possibly the listener in one discourse of the Sayyutta (iii. 79). Eeborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha, in a brahmin family,1 and named Gotama, he fell, when still a youth, into bad company, and gave all that he had to a courtesan. Repenting thereafter of his vicious ways, he beheld a vision of the Master seated — of Him who had discerned the pro¬ gress of his mind and his attainment of the conditions. He with heart assured went to the Master, was taught, and believed. Entering the Order, he won arahantship, even as the razor touched his hair. And while he was pondering the bliss of jhana and of fruition, a lay-companion asked him concerning his property. He confessed how he had lived unchastely, and declaring anna by his present purity from passion, said :

At ease they sleep, the wise and pure, who ne’er Are bound to womankind, for these must aye Be kept ’neath watch and ward, and among them ’Tis ever hard to learn the truth of things.2 (137) W ar to the knife with thee, O lust, we’ve waged. Now are we quit and free of debt to thee. Now fare we onward to that Going-out,3 Where at our journey’s end we weep no more. (138) 1 Not identical with the other Gotama Theras of CLNXXIII., CCXXXIX. There is a nice, discriminating touch about the Commentary’s remark: ‘Now to him [the friend] who is still bound to such women , the Thera, to show his own complete extirpation of that lust, says the second verse. The use of the first person plural is a rare feature in Buddhist hymns. It must refer to a sodality of freed minds, and not to the speaker and his quondam friend, since the latter had still his worldly ties. 3 Nibbana in the original. Since the Thera is an arahant, this can only refer to his Parinibbana, the complete extinction of his life spatially figured — his anupddisesa-nibbana, says the Commentary, however that was conceived.

Reborn in this Buddha-age at Vesall, as the son of a Licchavi raja,1 he was won over by the majesty of the Buddha when the latter went to Vesall, and left the world. In due course he won arahantship, and thereafter, gracious to his patrons, he did not reject the necessaries they pro¬ vided, but enjoyed what he received. The common-minded deemed him self-indulgent, but he continued taking no account of them. But near him dwelt a fraudulent bhikkhu, who deceived the people by pretending to lead the simple life, content with little, and was honoured by them. Then Sakka, ruler of the devas, discerned this, and came to Vasabha Thera and asked : ‘ Your reverence, what is it that an impostor does ?’ The Thera, in rebuke to that evil-doer, replied : He erst doth work destruction to himself ; Thereafter doth he ruin other men. Most throughly works he mischief to himself, E’en as decoy-bird 2 by its own deceit. (139) No brahmin he, by outward colour judged. By inner hue shall ye the brahmin know. He in whom deeds show evil, even he Is swarth of face, O consort of Suja.3 (140) Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Magadha, at Nalaka village, as the son of the brahminee Rupasarl,

1 See above, p. 54, n. 4. 2 Cf. vitaysa-kakkaro , the decoy jungle-cock in Jdt., ii. 161. 3 Sujampati, a title given to Sakka, whose consort-goddess was Suja. On the spiritual complexion, cf. Digha-NiJcdya , Suttantas iii., iv., and xxvii ; Sutta Nipdta , Vasettha-Sutta. and younger brother of Sariputta,1 he followed the latter into the Order, and after arduous, strenuous effort won arahantship. And glorying in his attainment and in solitude of life, he uttered this psalm : The will to learn maketli of learning growth ; Learning 2 makes insight grow, and by insight We know the Good ; known Good brings bliss along. (141) Seek ye the lonely haunts remote from men.3 Practise the life of liberty from Bonds. If there ye come not by your heart’s desire, Dwell with the Brethren, mindful and con¬ trolled. (142) Reborn in this Buddha-age as the son of a wealthy brahmin, in the Padiyattha country, he was named Jotidasa.4 When come of age he saw Kassapa the Great one day going his round for alms, and entertained him in his house, and heard him discourse. On the hill near the village he him¬ self had a great vihara built for the Thera, and supplied him with the four requisites. Moved thereafter by the Thera’s teaching he left the world, and not long after won the sixfold abhiniia. After ten years, during which he learnt

1 Cf. Sayy., iv. 251 ; v. 161 ; Psalms, I., p. 96. With his brother he visits Channa ( Majjli ., iii. 263; Sayy., iv. 55). He was one of the nine or ten chief Theras. Three discourses are ascribed to him in the Anguttara Nihdya, addressed to the bhikkhus, and preaching modesty and mutual tolerance, especially between the erudite and the more mystically inclined (iii. 355). 2 Lit., hearing, significant of an era of oral instruction and mnemonic recording. 3 The Master’s own advice to him {Majjli., i. 46). 4 Maha-Kassapa lived near Rajagaha (CCLXL), but neither Jotidasa nor Padiyattha-janapada have been met with in other works. the three Pitakas, with special proficiency in the VinayaPitaka,1 and waited on the fraternity, he set out with many bhikkhus to salute the Exalted One at Savatthi. On the way he entered a theologian’s park, and seeing a brahmin practising the fivefold austerity,2 he asked : ‘ Why, brahmin, do you not burn otherwise in a different heat ?’ The brah¬ min annoyed, answered : ‘ Master shaveling, what other heat is there ?’ The Thera replied : Anger , and envy, and all cruel deeds, And pride, and arrogance, and wanton strife, Craving, and ignorance, and lust of life :

These burn away and let thy body be ! 3 and therewith taught him the Norm. And all those theologians besought him for ordination. On leaving Savatthi he went to his former home, and admonished his relatives in these verses : They who in divers ways by deeds of force And violence,4 rude and rough-mannered folk, Do work their fellow-creatures injury, Thereby they too themselves are overthrown,5 For never is th’ effect of action lost. (143) The deed a man doth, be it good or ill, To all liis doing is lie verily the heir. (144) 1 Cf. Punna, who learnt them in a former birth ( Sisters , p. 116; again above, LXV.). We may concede thus much to the plausibility of the Commentator’s statement — that a threefold body of doctrine would be taking shape during the founder’s long ministry. 3 /.<?., surrounded by four fires, with the sun beating on him above. 3 I have not traced these lines. 4 On the word veghamissena , etc. (cf. Dialogues, ii. 107, n. 3), the Commentary has : ‘ Tugging the head, etc., by rein, strap, etc. ; blows given by hand, foot, etc.’ 5 Kir anti. Dr. Neumann has scien, sow, as if scattering seed. The Commentary ignores any such metaphor, and has : as they have made suffering for others, so by others are they made to suffer — tatlf eva annehi kiriyanti dnkkhay imply anti. Cf. abhikiranti in verse 598.

Reborn in this Buddha-age as the son of one who was a tenant-in-chief of the King of Kosala, and in command of bandits,1 he succeeded to his father’s position at the latter’s death. Converted on seeing the Buddha accept the Jeta Grove, he put his younger brother in his place, left the world, and soon after won arahantship. He thereupon sought to turn his brother to a better life, and on seeing him attached to it, urged him in these verses : The days, the nights flit by and pass away. Life is arrested, and the span To mortals given is consumed and fails, Like water in the shallow mountain streams. (145) But evil actions still the fool commits, Nor understands how dire the aftermath, Till comes the bitter hour of action’s fruit. (146) Hearing the Thera’s homily, the brother besought the king’s leave, and left the world, and not long after found salvation. Reborn in this Buddha-age at Benares, in a brahmin’s family and named Somamitta, he became an expert in the three Yedas, but was converted by the Thera Yimala2 and took orders. He dwelt near the Thera, fulfilling his duties. But the latter was given to sloth and torpor. And Somamitta, thinking ‘Who can be virtuous near a sluggard?’

1 Cora-vomsako , one having highwaymen or dacoits at his bidding, whether to employ, or to suppress, is doubtful. 2 Cf. the Yimala of CLXXXV., who was also of Benares. went to Kassapa the Great,1 and attending his lectures, established insight, aud soon after attained arahantship. Thereupon he rebuked Yimala in these verses : As one who, mounted on a puny plank, Is in mid-ocean whelm’d beneath the waves, So even he of blameless life doth sink, When thrown together with the man of sloth ; Wherefore from such an one keep well apart The sluggard and the poor in energ y- (147) Dwell thou with them who live aloof, With wise, with noble souls who have renounced, Who in rapt contemplation ever strive.2 (118) Hearing him, Thera Yimala was deeply moved, and establishing insight, bestirred himself to win salvation, the which he will be seen hereafter to attain. Reborn in this Buddha-age in the family of a brahmin of SavatthI, and named Sabbamitta, he saw, at the presentation of the Jeta Grove, the wondrous power of the Buddha, and entering the Order he obtained a subject for exercise and dwelt in the forest. After the rains he went into SavatthI to salute the Buddha, and on his way there lay a fawn caught in a trapper’s net. The doe, though not in the net, kept near from love for her young, yet dared not come close to the snare. The fawn, turning hither and thither, bleated for pity. Then the Thera : ‘ Alas ! the suffering that love brings to creatures !’ Going further he saw many bandits wrapping a man they had captured alive in straw, and

1 I.e., to Rajagaha (CCLXI.). 2 Repeated in CLXXXV. about to set fire to it. Hearing his cries, the Thera, out of his distress at both these things, uttered a verse within hearing of the bandits. Folk are bound up with folk and cling to folk. Folk suffer scathe from folk and wreak the same. (149) ^ hat boots thee then this folk, and brood of folk ? Let the folk go and get thee gone from them, Who as they go injure so many folk.1 (150) So saying, he forced his way to insight, and won arahantship. But the brigands, listening to his teaching, were moved in heart and renounced the world, practising the Norm in principle and in detail. Beborn in this Buddha-age at the town of Setavya, in the family of a merchant, he was named Mahakala.2 When come of age and dwelling at home, he took five hundred carts of merchandise to trade with to Savatthl. While resting there with his men in the evening, he saw the laity going with perfumes and garlands to the Jeta Grove, and went with them. There he heard the Master preach the Norm, believed, and entered the Order. Deciding on cemeterycontemplation, he dwelt in the charnel-field. And one day a woman named Kali, employed as crematrix,3 in order to give the Thera an object-study, cut off from a recently cremated body both thighs and both arms, and breaking the head into the semblance of a milk-bowl, arranged all

1 I read gacchantay. 2 So the Commentary ; not °kala. The name thus means ‘ big dark one,’ or, in the convenient Italian nomenclature, Neraccio. Kali, too, is ‘ brunette.’ 3 In Jat ., v. 449, we meet with a man pursuing this trade. the members together, placed them where the Thera studied for him to look at, and sat down at the side. The Thera seeing this exhorted himself in these verses : Kali, woman broad and swart of hue as blackbird, Now hath broken off a thighbone, now another ; Now hath broken off an arm, and now another ; Now the skull hath broken off as ’twere a milk bowl, Made them ready and is seated. (151) He who witless doth not understand, but maketh Cause for life renewed, comes back again to sorrow. Wherefore he who knows creates no more new causes. May I ne’er so lie again with scattered mem¬ bers!1 (152) Thus wholly self-mastered, the Thera brought forth insight and won arahantship. 1 The account of Kali’s activity closes with an odd half line, as if to mark, by a pause, the abrupt transition from the Thera’s half- amused notice of her grisly service, to the solemn quest of the End of Sorrow on which he is bent. This is a good instance of a poem which is scarcely intelligible without the Commentary’s help. With that help, the more literal the translation, the more intelligible is the verse.

Without it we have but to look at Dr. Neumann’s guessing and forced rendering, making Kali a wanton, and the good bhikkhu a prurient - minded fellow, to realize how relatively sane and simple even a scholastic exegesis may be. The practice of Asubha-jhana, or meditation on a base of some unlovely object, was recommended from the early days of the Sanglia, and, to judge by the accompanying illustration of a Ceylonese bhikkhu of to-day, is still practised. Cf. Bud. Psy ., p. 69, n. 2.

‘ May I ne'er so lie again with scattered members P To face p. 124, Reborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha, in a brahmin’s family, and named Tissa, he became an expert in the Vedas, teaching the mantras to five hundred brahmin boys, and winning the highest praise and renown. When the Master came to Rajagaha, Tissa saw the Buddha-majesty, and believed and entered the Order, thereafter winning arahantship through established insight. So also he won praise and renown. Now certain worldly-minded bhikkhus noting the atten¬ tion paid to the Thera were unable to endure it. The Thera knew this, and declared the evil in such attentions and his own detachment therefrom in these verses : Many the foes he gets, the bhikkhu shorn, Wrapt in his robe, to whom the world gives gifts Of food and drink, raiment and where to lodge. (153) Let him then, knowing all the bane herefrom, The fearsome peril in the world’s regard, Taking but little, free from lusting’s taint, Wary and mindful, hold his onward way. (154) Then those bhikkhus straightway sought the Thera’s forgiveness. His meeting with the Buddha, his emotion and his leaving the world are told in Canto I., the verse beginning, ‘As bidden by some power.’ 2 Here the Thera tells how he dwelt

1 Clearly quite a different Tissa from either of the foregoing Theras so named. Cf. Ps. XXXIX., XCVII. 2 His story having been given in Ps. CXVIII., the Chronicle begins at once with the circumstances resulting in the gatha. fraternally with his comrades, the venerable Anuruddha and the venerable Bhaddiya, Sakiyan rajas: W here lies the Eastern Bamboo Grove we dwell, Sons of the Sakiyans, comrades [all and true]. No little wealth have we renounced for this, Contented with whatever fills our bowl. (155) Quickened and ardent is our energy, Earnest and resolute [our heart’s intent] , Ever we boldly press toward [our goal]. Love of the Norm our [sure and sole] delight, All worldly loves by us forsworn outright. (156 » Beborn in this Buddha-age at Kapilavatthu, as the son of Baja Suddhodana and of Great PajapatT,1 and a joy to his kin, on his naming day he was named Nanda. When Nanda was of age, the Master, rolling the Wheel of the Norm, came out of compassion to Kapilavatthu. Making a shower of rain the occasion, he told the Yessantara Jataka.2 On the second day, by the verse ‘ Rise up,’ he established his father as a Stream-winner; Pajapati also by the verse, ‘Follow after a holy life, and the raja further, as a Once-returner. On the third day, when seeking alms at the coronation-hall where congratulations were being offered to Prince Nanda on his wedding, the Master handed the prince his bowl and wished him luck. And he, taking the bowl, followed the Master to the Vihara, who there ordained him, though Nanda wished it not.

1 See Ps. I., p. 6 /. Nanda is called Nandiya above (Ps. XXV.). This single verse may have been incorporated from some such collec¬ tion of Mara anecdotes as those in the Bhikkhunl-Saijyutta (see Windisch, MChcl und Buddhct , p. 134), and the form for his name used there left unaltered. The difference is only that between, e.g., Joy, Joyous. Jdt., vi., No. 547 ; Buddhist Birth Stories , p. 124. From that time, knowing that Nanda was oppressed by his distaste, the Master trained it away, so that Nanda, by thoroughgoing meditation, established insight and attained arahantship. Thereafter, enjoying the bliss of liberty, he said : 4 0 excellent method of the Master, whereby I was drawn out of the bog of rebirth and set on Nibbana’s strand !’ And joying in his reflections he uttered these verses : Heedless and shallow once my thoughts were set On all the bravery of outward show ; Fickle was I and frivolous ; all my days Were worn with wanton sensuality. (157) But by the Buddha’s skilful art benign, Who of sun’s lineage cometh, was I brought To live by deeper thought, whereby my heart From the great swamp of endless life1 I drew. (158)

And the Exalted One, discerning how eminently he was trained in self-control, declared him before the Order to be chief therein among his disciples,2 even therein conferring that distinction to which the Thera, in past ages, had once aspired. Beborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi, in a burgess’s family, he was named Sirimat (Faustus) because of his family’s good fortune and constant success. His younger brother, as increaser of that good fortune, was named Sirivaddha (growth of luck).3 They both saw the majesty of the Buddha when the Jeta Grove was presented, believed, and entered the Order. Sirivaddha, though- at first he won no abnormal powers, was honoured and feted by laity and 1 Bhava , becoming. Saysarajianke nimuggay. Cy. 2 He is so distinguished in Ang. Nik., i. 25. 3 Evidently not the Thera of Ps. XLI. recluses. But Sirimat, through defective karma, was little honoured ; nevertheless, exercising himself in calm and insight, he soon won the sixfold abhinna. Now the ordinary bhikkhus and novices, not knowing Sirimat was an Ariyan, continued to disparage him and to honour his brother. Then the Thera, blaming their faulty judgment, said: Others may laud and honour him Whose self is uncontrolled.

Surely amiss their praise is given, Since self is uncontrolled. (159) Others may chide and censure him Whose self is well controlled. Surely amiss their blame is given, Since self is well controlled. (100) Then Sirivaddha, hearing him, was agitated, and establish¬ ing insight, not long after he also completed his salvation. And they who had blamed the Thera sought his forgive¬ ness. Reborn in this Buddha-age at Saketa,1 in a brahmin’s family, he wTas named Uttara. Convinced by the twinmiracle at the Gandamba tree at Savatthi,2 whither some business had taken him, he was induced to leave the world when the Master, at Saketa, preached the Kalaka Park dis¬ course.3 Going with the Master to Rajagaha, he there developed insight and acquired sixfold abhinna. Returning again to Savatthi to wTait on the Buddha, the bhikkhus asked him : ‘ What, Brother, have you already accomplished your 1 See XXVIII. 2 Wrought by the Buddha (Sum. V., 57). A-fic/., ii. 24, on a Tathagata s clarity of knowledge and integrity. religious duties ?’ He, declaring anna, replied in these verses : W ell do I understand the factors five, And well is craving rooted out in me, Developed are the seven wisdom-chords,

And all the poison-fumes are shrunk to nought. (161) And since the factors now are understood, I— look you!1 — casting out the Huntress fell [Who sets her netted snare for every thought],2 And cultivating wisdom’s harmony,3 Sane and immune, in peace shall pass away.4 (102) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Bhaddiya,5 as the only child of a councillor whose fortune was worth eighty crores,6 he was named Bhaddaji, and was brought up in luxury, like that attending the Bodhisat in his last rebirth. . (The Commentary then relates the story of his sudden 1 So ’ liay , Jit. ‘ this [self-same] I.’ 2 Expansion of the one word jalirii , ‘she who lays a net’ — i.e., craving ‘by the suffusion of which the manifold web of the senses becomes as a net’ ( Attliasdlini , p. 363; Bud. Psy., p.i 278, n. 2). Cittacittasantdnato uddhavitvci (Commentary). 3 Bojjhangd, as in verse 161. Cf. Compendium , pp. 66, 180 f. The Commentary calls the seven ‘ the concord of the Norm.’ 4 Nibbdyissay andsavo, ‘ by the expiry of the last (moment of) consciousness, like a fire without fuel, I shall imrinibbdn-'&Xo without danger (of rebirth) ’ (Commentary).

5 In the Angas’ country, east of Magadha. Kotigama was near Patna. The Bodhisat is, of course, Gotama, before he became a Buddha. The Commentary differs from the Jataka version (see next page) only in a few small details, and uses independent phraseology. I.e., 800,000,000. The unit seems to have been a copper coin, termed kahdpana. See Bud. India , p. 100^. realization of arahantship while listening for the first time to the Buddha, the latter having come from Savatthi purposely to seek him out ; together with his following the Master and his company, the week after, to Kotigama, and retiring to the bank of the Ganges to become absorbed in jhana. Thence he emerges only when the Master came by, not heeding the preceding chief Theras. To vindicate his new supreme attainments, the Buddha invites him on to his own ferry-boat, and bids him work a wonder. Bhaddaji thereupon raises the submerged palace he dwelt in when he was King Panada, all being told in the ‘ Maha-panadaJafcaka,’ ii., No. 264.) Then the Thera described the golden mansion in which he had once lived, speaking of himself, that self having passed away,1 as of another : Panada was that king by name Whose palace was of gold ;

Sixteen apartments deep it stood, Aloft a thousandfold. (163) A thousand flights it rose on high, Its walls with scroll-work dight, With many a flaunting banner hung, With emeralds glittering bright. ’Twas there they danced, Gandharvas dunced, Six thousand in seven bands. (164) 1 On this mythical king see also Diglia , iii. 76; Jat., iv., No. 489. Dipavaysa, iii. 7 ; Mahavaysa (translation), xxxi. 7 ff. Jat. No. 264 gives a fuller account of Bhaddaji’s performance. The text versions are uncertain in some of the descriptive terms, and the Commentary’s authorities are equally divided. Hence the attempt at ballad form above does not claim to have selected an absolutely correct rendering. The last two lines refer to the vain efforts of mimes or musicians, collected by Panada’s father to make the prince smile. He, reminiscent of celestial art, was only moved to a slight smile when Sakka, the god, sent a celestial harlequin (Jat., op. cit.). Reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi, in a brahmin’s family, he was named Sobhita. And after he had heard the Master teach, had left the world and acquired sixfold abhinna, he practised recollecting his former lives with such success that the Master ranked him foremost among those who could so remember.1 And he, reflecting on his pre-eminence in attainment, was filled with joy ,* and breathed forth this psalm :

A bhikkhu mindful, gifted with insight, With strenuous effort strongly set to work, Have I [the infinite past] recalled to mind : Five hundred ages in a single night. (165) O let the Onsets Four of mindfulness2 My study be, the Seven,3 the noble Eight !4 For I [the infinite past] have called to mind : Five hundred ages in a single night. (166) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Vesall, in a brahmin’s family, he was named Kanhamitta. Come of age, he saw the majesty of the Buddha when the latter came to Vesall, 1 Ang. , i. 25. Sister Bhadda Kapilani was also thus distinguished ( Sisters , p. 47). Sobhita Thera (possibly this man) was the third in the apostolic succession of thirteen Abhidhammikas, who handed down this teaching till Mahinda conveyed it to Ceylon. Bhaddaii Thera was second. ( Atthasdlini , p. 32). 2 See Dialogues, ii. 327 ff. ; Compendium, p. 179. Bhdvayay = bhdvand hotu (Commentary). 3 Factors of Enlightenment, Wings of Wisdom (Compendium 4 The Eightfold Path (ibid.). and believing, he took orders under Maha-Kaccana. Dull of insight, and beginning to make effort, he was so long dependent upon the wisdom of his co-religionists that they called him Yalliya (Creeperling), saying, ‘ Like ivy and such plants, that cannot grow leaning on nothing, so he cannot get on without leaning on someone who is wise.’1

And it came to pass that he went to hear Thera Yenudatta preach, and becoming thereby heedful and in¬ telligent and ripe in knowledge, he asked that proficient teacher, saying : All that by earnest work has to be done, All that one fain to wake to truth must do, All that shall be my work nor shall I fail. O see my forward strides in energy ! (167) And do thou show me how and where to go — The Path that’s founded on Ambrosia— 2 So I in silent study pondering Shall to the silence of the seers attain, As glides great Ganga s river to the main.3 (168) Then Yenudatta gave him an exercise for study, and he, working at it, not long after won arahantship. Declaring anna, he uttered those same verses. 1 Apparently a different Thera from the Yalliyas of LIII. and CXXIII., in whose case Yalliya would seem to be no nickname. I have called valli (creeper) ‘ ivy,’ because of its typically representing for us such a character. On Maha-Ivaccana, see CCXXIX. Y enudatta is not met with elsewhere. 2 Nibbdne patitthitattd (Commentary). 3 The quarter verse ahay monena monissay has been perhaps unduly expanded, but it was to do justice to the association, for classic Indian literature, between the seer or sage (muni) and silence (cf. Chdndogya Upanishad, viii. 5, 2). The simile of the Ganges illustrates both silent progress and attainment. Nevertheless, the Commentary will have nothing to do with silence ; for it, monena is 1 by wisdom or insight,’ and monissay is ‘ I shall know or discern (Nibbana).’

Reborn in this Buddha-age, in the two hundred and eighteenth year thereof, as the younger brother of King Dhammasoka, he was named Vltasoka.1 Come of age, he acquired the accomplishments befitting noble youths, and then as a lay-pupil of Thera Giridatta became highly pro¬ ficient in the Sutta- and Abhidhamma-Pitakas. Now one day when his hair was being dressed, he took the mirror from the barber’s hand, and contemplating his body, saw some grey hairs. In agitation he sent down insight into his mind, and exerting himself to meditate, he became, as he there sat, a Stream-winner. Taking Orders under Giridatta, he not long after won arahantship. There¬ upon he thus declared anna : ‘Now let him shave me !’ — so the barber came. From him I took the mirror and, therein Reflected, on myself I gazed and thought : (169) ‘ Futile for lasting is this body shown.’ [Thus thinking on the source that blinds our sight My spirit’s] darkness melted into light. Stripped are the swathing vestments utterly !2 Now is there no more coming back to be ? (170) 1 According to the Commentary, Vltasoka (one who has ended grief) is none other than the younger brother of Emperor Asoka, whose career forms an episode in the Divyavadana (translated by Burnouf in Buddhisme Indien, 1844), in which Vltasoka is impelled to leave the world through the arahant Yasa. Neither Giridatta nor the barber episode is alluded to, which shows how different was the tradition handed on by Dhammapala. The grey hair episode is a very old tale, told in Majjh ., ii. 83 ; Jdt. , i., No. 9.

2 The barber was also bathman and head-dresser; hence cola, (vestments), which means any napery, may be an allusion to the muslin folds of the turban, or to bath robes and towels, or to dress. The Commentary only expands the altered scale of values in the prince’s life. PacchaveJcJchisay has the double sense of our ‘ reflected.’ Reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi in the family of a landed proprietor, he left the work after the birth of his firstborn. And dwelling near a village, he strove and worked till he acquired sixfold abhinna. Going thereupon to Savatthi and saluting the Master, he dwelt in a charnelfield. Now his son died, and his wife, desirous that their property, having no heirs, should not be taken over by the rajas, went with a large following to greet her husband, and induce him to leave the religious life. But the Thera, to show his passionless state and to vindicate his attain¬ ment, stood in the air and said : All the five Hindrances that bar the way 2 Against the safe, sure peace 3 I put aside. The mirror of the holy Norm I grasped : — 4 The knowing and the seeing what we are — (1T1)

So I reflected on this grouped frame 5 Within and eke without, and I beheld How, whether it was mine or not of me, The body empty [is and vanity]. (172) Reborn in this Buddha -age at Campa,6 in a burgess’s family, he was named Nandaka. He was the younger 1 See the other version in X. The Commentary recognizes no identity. 2 Desires of sense, malevolence, sluggishness, distraction, perplexity — to ‘ put aside ? these was the essential preliminary to attaining the serenity and detachment for fruitful intellectual effort ( Dialogues , i. 82-84). 3 Yoyakkhemay . See XXXII. 4 Sisters , verse 222. 5 Kayo is both body ( sarira ) and, generally, a group, or organism. 6 Capital of the Angas, now Bagulpur. Pronounced Champa. brother of Bharata, whose story will next be told. When both were come of age, they heard that Sona-Kolivisa 1 had left the world. And saying : 4 Even Sona who is so delicate has gone forth ; now what of us ?’ they, too, left the world. Bharata soon acquired sixfold abhinna, but Nandaka, through the strength of the corruptions, was not able to command insight, and could only practise for it. Then Bharata, wishing to help him, made him his atten¬ dant, and went forth from the vihara. Sitting down near the road he discoursed to him of insight.

Now a caravan passing by, an ox, unable to pull his cart through a boggy place, fell down. The leader had him released from the cart, and fed with grass and water. His fatigue allayed, the ox, reharnessed and strengthened, pulled the cart out of the bog. Then Bharata said : * Did you see that business, brother Nandaka?’ ‘I did.’ 4 Con¬ sider its meaning.’ And Nandaka said : 4 Like the refreshed ox, I, too, must draw forth myself out of the swamp of sapsara.’ And taking this as his subject in practising, he won arahantship. Then to his brother he declared anna in these verses : E’en though he trip and fall, the mettled brute Of noble breed will steadfast stand once more. Incited yet again to effort new, Foredone no longer, draws his load along. (173) So look on me as one who having learned Of Him, the all-enlightened One, and gained True insight, am become of noble breed, And of the Very Buddha son indeed. (174) Now when his younger brother Nandaka had confessed that he had gotten anna, Bharata conceived the idea : 1 See CCXLIII. The following object-lesson occurs in the case of Ramanlya-viharin, as the Commentary reminds us (XLV.h

‘ Let us both go forthwith to the Master, and tell him how we have carried out holiness of life.’ And he said these verses to Nandaka : Come, Nandaka, now go we unto Him Whose blessed teaching taught us all we know ; And in the presence of the Wake, the Chief, Let’s roar the lion’s paean of our hearts. (175) That quest for which the holy Sage in [love And great] compassion bade us 1 both go forth — That Good supreme both you and I have won, And every bond that hindered us is gone. (176) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha in a brahmin’s family, he came to be designated by his gens-name of Bharadvaja.2 Living the domestic life, a son was born to him, and he named him Kanhadinna. When the boy was of proper age, his father said, 4 Come, dear boy, and study under such and such a teacher,’ and sent him to Takkasila.3 On his way thither he made friends with a great Thera, a disciple of the Master, heard him teach the Norm, took orders, and after due training won arahantship. Now his father Bharadvaja heard the Exalted One teach the Norm at the Bamboo Grove Vihara, and he, too, left the world and realized arahantship. But Kanhadinna came to salute the Master at Rajagaha, and with joy he saw his father seated near the latter. And he asked himself : ‘ My father, too, has gone forth. Has he, I

1 Pabbiljayi pabbajesi. Cy. 2 A numerous gens, but not reckoned of high rank ( Vinaya Texts, iv. 6). At least twenty individuals of this surname are met with in the Pitakas. 3 The Taxila of Greek chroniclers, a famous ancient seat of learning in Kashmir. See the numerous references in the Jdtaha. wonder, attained the end of the religious life ?’ Then he dis¬ cerned that his father was an arahant, and wishing to make him utter a lion-roar, asked him : ‘ Hast thou succeeded in attaining the end of that for which we leave the world ?' Then Bharadvaja showed his attainment in these verses : Tis thus th’ enlightened lift their triumph-song, Like lions roaring in the hill-ravine,1 Heroes who in the holy war have won, And conquered evil, Mara and his host. (177) The servant of the blessed Master I, A votary of the Norm and Brotherhood ; And glad and gratified my heart to see My son purged of the poisons, sane, immune. (178) Beborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha, in a brahmin’s family, he was named Kanhadinna. Come of age, and impelled by the efficient cause culminating, he came to the General of the Norm,2 heard the Norm, believed, left the world, and developing insight, won arahantship. There¬ upon he thus declared aniia :

Waited have I on saintly men and heard Full many times the saving truths [they taught]. Hearing I knew I should attain the road That leads away from things that age and die.3 (179) 1 Cf. the introductory verses. 2 Sariputta. We are left in doubt as to whether Kanhadinna is the son in the preceding story or not. If he is, then the ‘great Thera ’ he met was Sariputta ; but in that case it is curious that the stories are not explicitly connected. 3 Lit., the ambrosial road; according to the Commentary — the Eightfold Path. ‘ I knew I should ’ is, literally, 1 1 shall [attain]/ He had already attained. And so in me all lust to live again Tims being utterly cast out, since then In me tis no more found, nor was’t, nor will it e’er Come back in me, nor at this hour doth rise in me.1 Pieboen in this Buddha-age in the family of a brahmin of Kosala, he was named Migasira2 after the constellation under which he obtained birth. And having acquired brahmin culture, he practised the skull-spell,3 so that, when he had muttered the spell and tapped with his nail on the skull, he would declare, * This person is reborn in such a sphere,’ even with respect to those who had been dead three years. Disliking domestic life, he became a Wanderer,4 and through his art won favour and respect. Coming to Savatthl and going before the Master, he declared his power, saying : ‘ I, master Gotama, can tell the destiny of dead persons.’ ‘How do you tell it?’ He let a skull be brought, and, muttering his rune and tapping with his nail, he asserted purgatory or some other sphere to be the place of rebirth.

Then the Exalted One had the skull of a bhikkhu brought, who had attained complete outgoing ( parinibbdna ), and said : ‘ Tell now his destiny to whom this skull belonged !’ Migasira muttered and tapped, but saw neither the beginning nor the end. Then the Master said : ‘ Art not able, Wanderer?’ He replied, ‘I must first make sure,’ and turning the skull round never so much — for how should he know the goings of an arahant?5 — stood ashamed, 1 Either glosses have crept in, or the additional feet in the latter gatha are intentional, to pile on emphasis. 2 Deer's head = Capricorn. 3 Cf. Vanglsa’s legend, CCLXIV. 4 See Rhys Davids, Buddhist India, pp. 141-143. 5 Cf. verse 92. perspiring, dumb. ‘ Art tired, Wanderer ?’ ‘ Ay, I am tired ; I cannot discern the destiny of this one. Do you make it known ?’ ‘ I know it, and more besides. He is gone to Nibbana.’1 Then said the Wanderer: ‘Give me this hidden lore !’ ‘ Then do you take orders.’ So Miga- sira was ordained, and was given exercises in calm. Well grounded in jhana and abhinna, he practised insight, and not long after won arahantship. He then confessed anna thus :

Since I went forth and entered on the Rule Ordained by the Enlightened One Supreme, Emancipated as I went, I rose Transcending all these things of sense-desire. (181) While He, that Very Brahmin,2 looked on me, O then my heart was set at liberty ! 3 Yea, since all bonds are broke for evermore, For me Emancipation’s fixed and sure ! (182) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha in a brahmin’s family, he was named Sivaka. And when he had acquired a complete education, he followed his inclination to leave the world. Coming as a Wanderer to hear the Master teach the Norm, he received faith, entered the Order, and eventually won arahantship. He then thus confessed anna : Transient the little houses [of our life], Built here, built there, again, ever again. Hunting the house-builder [thus far I come] ; Birth is but woe again, ever again. (183) 1 Nibbanay gato so, the only Pali approximation to the frequent rendering, ‘ entered into Nirvana,’ I have yet met with. 2 In the sense of chief, best (Commentary) ; a genitior absolute. 3 See Sisters, verses 17, 81, 116. Thou’rt found, house-maker thou, thou’rt seen at last ! Never again shalt fashion house [for me] !

Broken are all thy walls, shattered thy roofs. Stayed is the further rise of consciousness ; Blown ’twill be even here to nothingness.1 (184) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi, in a brahmin’s family, he was named Upavana. He saw at the Jeta Grove presentation the majesty of the Buddha, and entering the Order, practised for insight, and won sixfold abhinna. Now Upavana became attendant on the Exalted One.2 And at that time the Exalted One was attacked by cramp. And Devahita, a brahmin lay-friend of the Thera, living at Savatthi, was supplying him with the four necessaries. See¬ ing him come with bowl and robe, Devahita discerned that he needed something different and said : ‘ Let your reverence be supplied. What do you need ?’ And Upavana answered : The Arahant, the Well-Come of all men, The Holy Sage, he suffereth sore with wind. If there be any water heated here, O give it to me, brahmin, for the Sage. (185) Revered by them to whom we reverence owe, Cherished by them who claim our pious care, Honoured by them to whom honour is due, For Him I do beseech it may be brought. (186) 1 Legend has assigned these famous verses as the Buddha’s first logion, after his attainment of Buddhahood {Bud. Birth Stories , p. 103/. ; Sum. V., i. 16) ; but they do not occur in the canonical descriptions of that event (c/. the slightly different Gathas, Dhp., 158, 154; SBE, x. 42, to.). Dhammapala is briefer than usual, apparently ignorant of the tradition given in Buddhaghosa. He makes no allusion to it. The house-builder, he points out, is craving, tanha vaddhaki.

2 See CCLX. On the ailment of Milinda i., 194, to. 4. Thereat the brahmin offered both hot water and suitable medicine. Thereby the Master’s sickness was healed, and to him the Exalted One rendered thanks. Reborn in this Buddha-age in the country of the Sunaparantas,1 in the family of a councillor, he was named Isidinna. Grown up, he saw the double miracle at the presentation of the Sandalwood Pavilion,2 and coming with a satisfied mind to the Master, he heard the Norm, and became a Stream-winner. While still living a domestic life, a compassionate spirit urged him, saying : I mark the pious laity who treasure on their lips the Norm ; How you may often hear them say : ‘ Transient are all this world’s desires !’ But in their hearts lies love of pelf, of precious stones and jewelled rings, And that which fills their thought is care of sons and daughters and of wives. (187) Nay, verily, they do not know the inward meaning of the Norm ; E’en though you often hear them say : ‘ Transient are all this world’s desires !’ To cut themselves from passions free, they lack the spiritual health, And therefore cleaveth aye their heart to wife and children, and to wealth. (188)

When the layman heard this, he was thrilled with emotion, and leaving the world, he not long after won arahantship. In confessing anna, he repeated these verses. 2 I cannot trace this legendary event elsewhere. Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Magadha, as the son of a burgess of the Kaccana’s, he was named Sambula, but was known as Sambula-Kaccana.1 After he had heard the Master teach the Norm, and had entered the Order, he went to the neighbourhood of the Himalaya, and practised his insight exercises in a cave called Bheravayana (‘ dreadful-passage ’). Now one day there arose a great storm-cloud out of season, towering high in the heavens, emitting roars of thunders, forked lightning, and rushing noise. And it began to rain, and thunderbolts burst. All creatures — bears, hyenas, buffaloes, elephants — cried out in fear and trembling. But the Thera had stirred up insight, and, careless as to body and life, heeded not the noise, but cooled by the storm so composed his mind, that he quickened insight, and won arahantship together with abhinna. Thereupon reflecting on his achievement he was filled with joy, and in a psalm confessed anna : God’s rain pours down, ay, and god’s rain roars down,

And I alone in fearsome hollow dwell. Yet dwelling so in fearsome rocky dell To me no fear comes nigh, no creeping dread, No quailing [of my soul]. (189) For such the law Within the blessed Norm, that dwelling so To me no fear comes nigh, no creeping dread, No quailing [of my soul] to me, alone.2 (190) 1 There was need to distinguish him from other Kaccanas — e.g., CCXXIX. In Phayre MS. and Br. Cy., Sampahula-. 2 The metre in these graceful gathas I cannot allocate under any of the textbook varieties. The words, * For such . . . Norm,’ are an expansion of the Suttanta term, Dhammatd (mam:)"esd — ‘ This for'me is Normness’ (c/. Dialogues , ii. 8, n. 3; my Buddhism , p. 119). Deva (god), the Commentary, as before, paraphrases with megha (cloud). Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Kosala as the son of a brahmin, and named Khitaka,1 he heard the Norm from the Master, and entering the Order, dwelt in a forest till he won arahantship. Thereupon continuing in the bliss of fruition, of Nibbana, a Thera enthusiastic for endeavour, he went to the bhikkhus dwelling in that forest to stir enthusiasm in them. First asking concerning their good, he spoke these verses, therein confessing anna :

Whose heart stands like a rock, and swayeth not, Void of all lust for things that lust beget, And all unshaken in a shifting world ? 2 To heart thus crained, whence shall come aught of ill? (191) My heart stands like a rock, and swayeth not, Void of all lust for things that lust beget, And all unshaken in a shifting world. My heart thus trained— whence shall come ill to me ? (192) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Kapilavatthu, as the son of the zemindar3 Potiriya, he was named Sona. Come of age, he became chief captain of the forces of Bhaddiya, a Sakiyan raja. Now Bhaddiya having left the world, as will be described below, Sona thought : 4 If even the raja has left the world, what have I to do with domestic life ?’ 1 Identical with the author of CIV. ? 2 Lit., shakes not in that which tendeth to shake. 3 On the position of a bliojcika holding land in fief, see Dialogues , i. 108, n. 1; on Bhaddiya, see CCLIY. Anupiyii, in the Mallas’ territory, lay east of Kapilavatthu. On the vision, cf. several of the first Sisters’ psalms. So he took orders, but remained sluggish, not given to meditative exercise. On him the Exalted One, dwelling in the Mango Grove at Anupiya, sent forth his glory, and arousing him to mindfulness uttered admonitory verses :

Nay, not for this that thou mayest slumber long, Cometh the night in starry garlands wreathed. For vigil by the wise this night is here. (193) Hearing him, Sona was exceedingly agitated, and keep¬ ing his shortcomings before the mind, adopted the open-air practice, exercising himself for insight. And he uttered this verse : If in the light my warrior-elephant Advanced, ’twere better, fallen from his back,1 Dead on the field [and trampled I should lie], Than beaten live a captive to the foe. (194) So saying, he stirred up insight and won arahantship, and thereupon repeated the Master’s words and his own as his confession of anna. Reborn in this Buddha-age in the country of the Koliyans,2 in a clansman’s family, he was named Nisabha. Come of age, he saw the Buddha’s wisdom and power at the fight between the Sakiyans and Koliyans, and believing, entered the Order, anon winning arahantship. Thereupon seeing a fellow-bhikkhu spending his time 1 The Commentary confirms the reading avapatitarj ( vide Neumann) . The figure is a very natural one for an Indian soldier, and its applica¬ tion is easy. Metaphors from warfare are less frequent in Buddhist than in Christian literature, and the few contained in this work almost exhaust them. ‘ Trampled ’ (by the elephant) is a Commentarial gloss.

2 A clan separated from the Sakiyans by the River Rohinl. Cf. C., CCXXXIII. carelessly, he admonished him, adding another verse to show he acted that which he preached : Put them away, those fivefold things of sense, Objects that charm and captivate the mind. Thou who through faith didst give up home and world, Become end-maker of its grief and pain. (195) With thought of death I dally not, nor yet Delight in living. I await the hour With mind discerning and with heedfulness.1 (196) Keborn in this Buddha-age at Kapilavatthu in the family of a Sakiyan raja, he was named Usabha. And when the Master visited his own folk,2 Usabha saw his power and wisdom, believed in him, and entered the Order. From that time he fulfilled no religious duties, but passed all day in society and all night in sleep. Now one day, muddled in mind and unheedingly dropping off to sleep, he dreamt that he shaved, put on a crimson cloak, and, sitting on an elephant, entered the town for alms. There, seeing the people gathered together, he dis¬ mounted full of shame. Thereupon he awoke thinking : ‘ Why, this was a dream ! Muddled in head and thought¬ less I saw myself in sleep.’ And with anguish he established insight, and in due course won arahantship.

Thus having made the dream his goad, he celebrated it to confess aima, saying : A cloak the hue of purple mango-buds Draping about my shoulder, I bestrode The back of elephant, and so to seek Mine alms into the village street I rode. (197) 1 Cf. XX., and ver. 607. 3 Cf. CCXXXIII. Down from his back [in very shame] I slid — [When lo ! I woke and] anguish seized me then. This arrogant self was then made meek and mild, Purged were the poisons [that my mind defiled].1 (198) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Savatthi in poor circum¬ stances, the only way he knew of to support himself was to go about, clad in rags, pan in hand, seeking for rice-grains.2 Hence he became known as Kappata-kura — ‘Rags-and-rice.’ When grown up, he maintained himself by selling grass. Reaping this one day in the forest, he saw a Thera. Doing obeisance he sat down near him, and heard him teach the Norm. Then he believed, and saying * What to me is this wretched mode of life?’ he entered the Order, bestowing his ragged cloth in a certain place. And when repugnance [to his new life] arose in him, he would go and look at the rags and feel unsettled. So doing, he seceded seven times from the Order. Then the bhikkhus told the Exalted One of this. And he one day, when Kappata-kura, as bhikkhu, sat in the preaching-hall at the edge of the congregationdozing, admonished him in these verses :

‘ These,’ saith he, ‘ are the rags of Rags-and-Rice I Too heavy is the gear I’m wearing now.’ Full measure of the Norm hath he in shower Ambrosial ; and yet no step he takes To practise contemplative discipline. (199) 1 Another instance where the legend straightens out the tangle of the gatha taken in isolation. What, e.g., had the elephant rider to do with ‘ to seek mine alms ’ ? Dr. Neumann has been compelled to excise the phrase. As the anomaly of a dream, the little poem is quite clear. ‘ Then . . . then ’ is a repetition copied from the text. 2 Kura , occurring once as kiira in the Commentary ( = in Childers and in Bohtlingk and Roth, ‘ boiled rice ’), is probably wild rice in some form or other. Cf. sukkha-kura in the Sutta-Vibhanga of the Yinaya, . edition Oldenberg, iv., Pac. 38, 1. O Kappata, thou shouldst not sway and nod, Nor make me cuff the word into thine ear. Never a whit thou, Kappata, hast learned, Sleepily swaying ’midst the listeners here.1 (200) Thus the Exalted One upbraided him strongly, as if He had pierced his very bones, as if a fierce elephant had gone down into his path. And he, greatly disturbed, established insight, and soon won arahantship. Thereupon he repeated the verses which had been the goad that sent him to the goal, so that they became his confession of anna.

Reborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha, his mother was the daughter of a councillor. She having failed to gain her parents’ consent to leave the world while yet a maiden, was married, and obtained her husband’s consent to take Orders, not knowing at the time that she had conceived. When later the bhikkhums saw her condition, they con¬ sulted Devadatta, who replied : ‘ She is no true nun !’ They then consulted Him-of-the-Ten-Powers. He entrusted the matter to Thera Upali, who convened certain residents at SavatthI, including the lay-patroness Visakha, and in full 1 These verses remain not exactly the reverse of ‘ obscure sayings,’ as Dr. Neumann calls them, even after the help of the legend. The Commentary, in both versions, is scarcely as lucid as usual ; yet such explanation as it gives is, as ever, to show a situation of a simple and probable kind — the ragged loincloth, with its vagabond associations, supplying a Bohemian and pagan lure, making the more decorous yellow robes seem cumbrous, and the discipline irksome. The legend is a distinct addition to the ‘ human documents ’ of the Order’s traditions. assembly, the king being present, pronounced the Sister to have been with child when she took orders. The Master approved his decision. So she brought forth her child at the Vihara, a boy like a golden statue, and the king reared him, and brought him later on to the Master to join the Order. Because he joined as a youth,1 and they would ask, when the Exalted One said, * Send for Kassapa,’ or ‘ Give this fruit or biscuit to Kassapa,’ ‘ Which Kassapa ?’ and because of his royal rearing, he became known as KumaraKassapa, even after he was grown to manhood.

Now while he exercised himself for insight and learnt the Buddha-word, he dwelt in Dark Wood.2 Then a deva, one who had with him done only the mountain-recluse’s course, and having become a Non-Returner, had been reborn as a Great-Brahma in the Pure Abodes, determined to show Kumar a- Kassapa a method for attaining the Paths and Fruits. And he came into the Dark Wood, and showed him fifteen questions which only the Master could answer. So he asked them before the Exalted One and learnt them ; whereupon having conceived insight,3 he attained arahantship. Thereupon, having been ranked by the Master foremost among those who had the gift of varied and versatile dis¬ course, he reviewed his career, and under the aspect of , . » '* i 1 In his twentieth year ( Vinaya Texts , i. 229). 2 At Savatthl. Three of the Sisters’ psalms are associated with it. On the technical expressions used in the next sentence, see Com¬ pendium, p. 91. , 3 An exceptional and curious phrase, borrowed from the terms of maternity : Vipassanay gabbhay ganhdpetvd — an echo, perhaps, of the description of his mother’s ordeal described above. The story of the Thera is told also in the Commentary on the Anguttara Nihdya, i. 24 ; in Jataka, i. 148 ff. ; and in the Commentary on the Dhammapada , iii. 144 ff. The questions arising from the deva’s visit are in Majjh., i. 143, ‘ Yammika - Sutta.’ An interesting feature in the Commentary is a reference made by its author, Dhammapala, to the Commentary on the Anguttara Nihdya. Where Dhammapala writes gehe , he adds : ‘ The Anguttaratthakatha says hulagehe ' — as, indeed, it does. Hence it would seem that Buddhaghosa wrote before Dham¬ mapala.

extolling the virtues of the Jewel-Trinity, confessed his anna : All hail the Buddhas, and all hail the Norms.1 Hail the blest System by our Master wrought, Wherein he that doth hear may [be enrolled And] come to realize a Norm like ours. (201) Down countless ages have its members come, Reborn now as this compound, now as that. But this for them is now the very last, The final confluence of the factors five,2 In flux of rebirth and mortality. Now come they never more again to be. (202) Reborn in this Buddha-age, when the Master had passed away, in the kingdom of Avanti,3 as a brahmin’s son, he was named Dhammapala. As he was returning from Takkasila, his schooldays finished, he saw on his way a certain Thera in a single cell,4 and hearing from him the Norm, he believed, left the world, and acquired sixfold abhinna. Now, as he was ruminating in the bliss of his achieve¬ ment, two novices climbed a tree at the Vihara to pick blossoms, and a branch breaking, they were falling. Seeing them, the Thera caught them with his hand, and by his 1 Cf. Majjh ., ii. 96, where the apostrophe is in the singular number. The plural dhammd , as applied to Norm, is perhaps unique. The Commentary has — ‘ the Doctrine, together with the nine lokuttard dhammd' These are enumerated in the Patisambhidd (ii. 166) as the seven groups given in Compendium, pp. 179-181 ( a — g), plus the Paths and Fruits, and Nibbana making ten.

2 Samussayo, compound of the five khandhas, bodily and mental. Cf. p. 80, n. 2. The country just east or north-east of Bombay. See Bud. India , 4 Ekasmiy vihare. Cf. Dialogues , ii. 4, n. 1. iddhi-power1 placed them unhurt upon the ground. And he taught them, saying : The brother who while young hath given himself Wholly to carry out the Buddha’s plan, Who keepeth vigil in a sleeping world, Not vainly, not for naught he spends his days. (203) So let the wise man, so let him who aye Remembereth that which Buddhas have enjoined, Devote himself to faith and righteousness, To know the blessedness They brought to us, And the true vision of the holy Norm.2 (204) Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Kosala, as a brahmin’s son, he was named Brahmali. When grown up, being impelled by the fulness of conditions, distress arose in him because of the continual round, and, through associating with spiritually minded friends, he left the world, and took his exercise to a forest. From the maturity of his knowledge he soon developed insight, and acquired sixfold abhinna. Dwelling thereafter in the bliss of the Paths, the Thera, so versed in compassing endeavour, uttered one day these verses, on behalf of the bhikkhus in that forest, concerning devotion to endeavour :

In whom the senses have been hushed to calm, Like horses well tamed by the charioteer, In whom no vain conceits are found, nor aught Of poison-fumes survives, a man like this May stir up envy e’en among the gods. (205) 1 Compendium, pp. 60 jf., 209. 2 The literal Pali of these two lines is the two very pregnant terms pasdday (expressing relief, satisfaction, trust) and dhammadassanay (insight into or through the Dhamma). From Buddhism, Rangoon, December, 1903 ‘ The Brother who ivhile young hath given himself Wholly to carry out the Buddha's plan. . . To face p. 150. In me the senses have been hushed to calm, Like horses well tamed by the charioteer, In me no vain conceits are found, nor aught Of poison-fumes survives ; — one such as I May stir up envy e’en among the gods.1 (206) Reborn in this Buddha-age in a brahmin’s family, and named Mogharajan,2 he studied under the brahmin Bavariya. Growing distressed, he became an ascetic. He was one of the sixteen, Ajita and others, who was sent by Bavariya to the Master to interview him.3 When Mogharajan had asked his question and been answered, he attained arahantship. Thereafter he acquired distinction by wearing rough cloth which caravaners, tailors and dyers had thrown away. Wherefore the Master assigned him the first place among those who wore such rough clothing [he thereby realizing his aspiration made many ages ago].4

At another time, from want of care and through former karma, pimples and the like broke out and increased on his body. Judging that his lodging was infected, he spread out a couch of straw in the Magadha fields, and there, though it was winter, he lodged. Of him, waiting one day 1 The first gatha is found in the Dhammapada , verse 94, spoken, according to the Commentary (ii. 176 /.), by the Buddha concerning Maha Kacca[ya]na. Cf. below, CCXXIX. 2 This curious name (= futile king) seems to be nowhere explained. The one so named in Sayy. Nik., i. 23, seems to be a deva, but a verse by a Mogharaja-Thera in Milinda, ii. 359, is one of those not incorporated in this Canon. 3 See Sutta-Nipdta , verses 976-1031, 1116-1119. Cf. also XX (Ajita), and the varied ‘ BavarT,’ ‘ Bavariya-brahmano.’ 4 Ang. Nik., i. 25. upon the Master, and paying his respects, the latter of his courtesy inquired in the following verse : Well, Mogharajan, thou skin-sufferer, Thou blest of heart and constantly serene, Cometh the time when winter nights are cold, And thou a brother poor — how wilt thou fare ? (207) Thus asked, the Thera explained the matter to the Master :

Rich are the cornfields of the Magadhese,1 And thriving, every one, I’ve heard it said. My little straw-built canopy doth please Better than others’ way of finding ease. (208) Visakha the Paneali’s Son. Reborn in this Buddha-age in the kingdom of Magadha, as the son of a district raja, he was named Visakha. But because he was the son of the daughter of the king of the Pancalas,2 he became known afterwards as the Pancall’s son. At his father’s death he succeeded to his title, but when the Master came to his neighbourhood he went to hear him, and believed, and left the world. Following him to Savatthi, he established insight, and acquired sixfold abhihna. Thereupon, in kindness to his own folk, he visited his native place. And as people kept coming to hear him, he was one day asked : ‘ How many qualities, your reverence, should a man acquire to be a preacher of the Norm ?’ The 1 On the large fields of Magadha see my ‘Early Economic Conditions in Northern India,’ JBAS , 1901, p. 860. Klietta , the collective singular, has here become khettani, but cf. p. 153. 2 An ancient kingdom, lying to the east of the Kurus, whose capital was where Delhi stands {Bud. India). Pronounced Panchala.

CLXV. VISAKHA THE PANCALl’s SON 153 Thera taught them the essential feature of such an one as follows : 1 Let him not be puffed up, nor other folk Belittle, nor despise nor yet molest The victor who hath overcome the world.2 Nor let him drag the praises of himself Before the public ; let him be3 sober, meek, And moderate in speech and virtuous. (209) Is there a man who can the truth discern, Tho’ it be very subtle and refined ? Who skilled to measure spiritual growth, Is yet of lowly, and of gentle mind. Who shapes his life by rule of Them that W ake : For him, Nibbana is not hard to find.4 (210) Reborn in this Buddha-age at Rajagaha, as a brahmin’s son, he was named Culaka. When he saw the Master tame the elephant Dhanapala,5 he believed, and left the world. Working at his training, he dwelt in the Indra-sal-tree Cave.6 One day as he sat in the entrance of the cave, looking down over the Magadha ‘ field,’ a great stormcloud filled the sky with piled-up masses, and amid deep, lovely roars, the rain came down. The flock of peacocks, hearing the thunder, joyously uttered their k6-ka cry,7 and

1 The Buddha is recorded as having assigned the first place among the dhammakathika' s to Punna among the Brethren (IV.), Dhammadinna among the Sisters ( Sisters , p. 17), and Citta among laymen j nevertheless, he specially praised this Thera’s teaching ( Sayy . Nik., ii. 280; Any. Nik., ii. 51). 2 Lit., him who hath gone beyond. 3 Siydti should here, writes the Commentary, be added as a kriya-pada. 4 This is Vacchapala’s psalm (LXXI.) ; also, be it noted, a Magadhese. 5 See Milinda, i. 298/., nn. on Vinaya Texts, iii. 247/. 6 See Dialogues, ii. 299. 7 See XXII., n. 2. danced around. The touch of the storm-breeze brought coolness and comfort to the Thera in his cavern-lodge, so that with a suitable temperature his mind became con¬ centrated. He entered the avenue of his exercise, and, discerning that the favourable moment was come, he praised his practice, breaking out in these verses : Hark ! how the peacocks make the welkin ring, Fair-crested, fine their plumes and azure throat, Graceful in shape and pleasant in their cry. And see how this broad landscape watered well Lies verdure-clad beneath the dappled sky ! (211) Healthy thy frame and fit and vigorous To make good progress in the Buddha’s rule.

Come then and grasp the rapt thought of the saint,1 And touch the crystal bright, the subtly deep, The elusive mystery — even the Way Where dying cometh not, ineffable. (212) And so the Thera, admonishing himself, attained under seasonable conditions to mental concentration, and evoking insight, won arahantship. Thereupon reviewing what he had wrought, with zest and joy he repeated those lines as the confession of anna. Eeborn in this Buddha-age in a wealthy family at Kosala, his beauty obtained him the name of Anupama — ‘ Peerless.’ Come of age, he felt the working of the efficient cause, forsook the world, and dwelt in the forest, 1 Sumanassa, paraphrased by sundaramanassa yogdvacarassa. ‘ Come,’ ‘ grasp,’ ‘ touch,’ are expansions of the Pali phusdhi, the last of the three verbs. The long-drawn-out Jagati metre of the two gathas relies on reiteration of the adaptable prefix su (Greek ev) — good, fair, well — to convey intense gladsomeness. practising for insight. But his mind hovered about external objects, revolving about his theme for meditation, so that he thus rebuked himself : O heart ! gone gadding after things that please, O thou that shapest many a shaft of doom,

There and there only dost thou ever tend Where block and stake rise at the bitter end. (213) I call thee, heart, the breaker of my luck ! I call thee, heart, despoiler of my lot ! Lo ! He whom many an age thou couldst not find, The Master now is come — suffer it not That I to wreck and ruin be consigned.1 (214) Thus admonishing his own consciousness, the Thera developed insight, and won arahantship. Keborn in this Buddha-age in a wealthy Kosalan family, after deceasing from the Brahma world, he ever wept in his mother’s arms. And because he could not endure the touch of a woman, he came to be called Vajjita — ‘ abstaining.’ Come of age, he saw the Master work the twin-miracle,2 and believing, he entered the Order, and acquired sixfold abhinna. Thereupon remembering his former existence, he was stirred with holy emotion, and said : A traveller I these long, long ages past, And round about the realms of life I’ve whirled ; One of the many-folk and blind as they, No Ariyan truths had I the power to see. (215) 1 This eloquent poem is a miniature version of Talaputa’s longdrawn-out apostrophe to his cliitta (CCLXII.). The Commentary identifies Jcaliy with Kdlakanni , goddess of ill luck. The last words of the text should, of course, be understood as nid anatthe, etc.

2 Cf. p. 36, to. 1. But earnestly I strove for light and calm ; And now all shattered lies the endless way. All future bournes abolished utterly, Now cometh never more rebirth for me. (216) And this became the Thera’s confession of anna. Reborn in this Buddha -age in a wealthy family of Kosala and named Sandhita, he heard, when come of age, a sermon on impermanence, and this alarmed him so that he entered the Order. Through the maturity of his knowledge he established insight, and acquired sixfold abhinna. Recalling his own former life, how after the passing away of Sikhi Buddha he had worshipped at the Bo-tree and acquired discernment of impermanence,1 he declared his winning of the goal, by that efficient cause, in these verses : Beneath the tree— the holy Bodhi-tree— Clad in the glory of its vernal green, To me musing and mindful came a thought A Buddha-burdened thought. • (217) ’Tis one and thirty aeons since it came. Natheless so fruitful proved that thought in me, By dint thereof o’er the intoxicants The victory is wrought ! (218) 1 In lamenting that he only heard of that Buddha just as he had passed away. On Sikhi, see Dialogues , ii. 6. ‘ Bodhi-tree is assatthe, or the species of fig-tree which was Gotama Buddha’s Bo-tree. Sikhi’s was a kind of mango (see Childers’s ‘ Pundarika ’), and the Com¬ mentary is at some pains to explain that assattha had come to stand for Bo-tree associations in general. ‘ Thought '—sauna, aperfu— is repeated thrice in the text.

Reborn in this Buddha-age near the Himalaya, at the city of Ukkattha,1 in the family of a very rich brahmin, he was named Anganika-Bharadvaja.2 And when he had learned all Yedic lore and art, his inclination for renuncia¬ tion induced him to leave the world and carry on penance for salvation.3 Wandering here and there, he met the Buddha Supreme on a country tour, and with satisfied mind heard him teach. Leaving his false ascetics, he took orders, and practising for insight, in due course acquired sixfold abhinna. Abiding thereafter in the bliss of liberty, he took com¬ passion on his kinsfolk, and visited and taught them in the Refuges and the Precepts ; then leaving them, he went to dwell in a forest near the village of Kundiya of the Kurus.4 1 On this upland town ( = ‘ lofty’), see Dialogues, i. 108. A road connected it with Setavya (sup., p. 67 ; Ang., ii. 37) and with Vesall (Jdt., ii. 259, text). 2 There are about nineteen Bharadvajas (a gens name) mentioned in the Pitakas. This one is not met with elsewhere. 3 That which, in the text, is amaray tapay (‘ penances . . . for heaven ’) is, in the Commentary, rendered amatatapay , amatay tapay. The difference, etymologically, is that between ‘ undying ’ and ‘not dead.’ Both refer, probably, to reunion with the gods, as attainable by the penance of the five fires, etc. See sup., p. 120, and Dialogues, i. 211.

4 This will not be the Kundiya of the Koliyas (ZJcldna, ii. 8; Jdt., i. No. 100). XJggayama is possibly the place Ugga of LXXX. Going for some purpose to Uggayama, he was accosted by some brahmin acquaintances, who said : ‘ Master Bharadvaja, what have you seen that you have left the brahmin communion for this community ?’ And he, showing that outside the Buddha’s church there was no pure rule, said : Purity without principle my quest, When in the grove I fostered sacred fire. Painful the penances I wrought for heaven, All ignorant of purity’s true path. (219) This happiness by happy ways is won1 — O see the seemly order of the Norm ! 2 The threefold wisdom have I gotten now, And all the Buddha’s ordinance is done. (220) Once but a son of brahmins born was I ;3 To-day 1 stand brahmin in very deed, Versed in the triple lore and graduate,4 By sacramental bathing consecrate. (221) Then those brahmins hearing him, expressed enthusiastic appreciation of the Sasana. Reborn in this Buddha-age at the city of Rohi, in a nobleman’s family, he was named Paccaya.5 Inheriting the estate at his father’s death, he decreed to hold a great ceremonial oblation, and a great assembly foregathered.

2 Cf. XXIV. He is addressing either the Norm or himself, says the Commentary, omitting the more probable ‘ or the brahmins.’ 3 Cf. p. 222 ; also the very similar lines, Sisters , verse 251 and note. 4 The Commentary finds Sasana- equivalents for all these terms of Vedic tradition. 5 Neither raja nor city is found elsewhere. Pacchaya (pronounce thus) was the name of the elephant of Vessantara, a Sakiyan ancestor (Jat.j vi. 485, text). At that congress, the Master, seated on a throne in a jewelled pavilion made by (his ancestor) Vessavana,1 taught the Norm, while all the people gazed at him. Even the great multitude understood the doctrine, but raja Paccaya went further. For impelled by earlier causes, he renounced his estate and left the world. And even as he had vowed in Kassapa Buddha’s time, so now, entering his cell, he vowed to attain before he left it again. And now at last, insight growing, and knowledge attaining full maturity, he attained arahantship. Thereupon, celebrating his achievement, he thus con¬ fessed anna : Five days have now gone by since I went forth, A learner, and my mind not perfected.2 Then in the heart of me within my cell Retired uprose unfaltering resolve : (222)

I wdll not eat nor will I drink again, Nor from this lodging let me issue forth, Nor will I even lie upon my side, While yet the dart of Craving lies undrawn.3 (223) Thus steadfast I abiding — O behold And mark the forward stride of energy : In Threefold Wisdom have I made my own, And all the Buddha bids us do is done ! (224) Born at Kosambi in a councillor’s family before our Exalted One appeared, he was being bathed for his health in the Great-Yamuna River,4 when a fish swallowed him 1 Cf. p. 189, n. 1. Jilt., vi. 265/. (text). 2 A phrase of the Nikayas ( Majjli ., i. 4; Saijy., i. 121, v. 145). 3 A resolve enjoined on learners [Majjh., i. 480; Ang., i. 50; Sayy ii. 28). 4 The Jumna. Kosambi was near the confluence of the Jumna and Ganges (at Allahabad). Bakula’s or Bakkula’s story is given in the out of the nurse’s hands. The fish was caught by an angler and sold to the wife of a Benares councillor. When it was split open, the child through the might of his merit appeared unhurt. The wife cherished him as her son, and when she heard his story, asked him of his parents. The king decided they should have him in common, hence he was named Ba-kula (‘ two-families,’ bi-kin ).

After a prosperous life he heard the Master preach, and left the world at eighty years of age. For seven days he remained unenlightened, but as the eighth dawned he attained arahantship, together with thorough mastery of the letter and spirit of the doctrine.* 1 One day the Master, when assigning manifold eminence to his disciples, ranked Bakula foremost for good health.2 Thereafter he, when about to pass away, confessed anna in the midst of the Brethren thus : He who is fain to-morrow to perform The things that he should yesterday have done, Forfeit of happy opportunity, He shall anon repent him fierily.3 (225) Let him but talk of that which should be done ; Let him not talk of what should not be done ! Of him who talketh much, but doeth not, Wise men take stock, and rate him at his worth.4 (226) Anguttara-Nikaya Commentary and in the Singhalese Corny, of Milinda (ii. 10, n. 2). His legend tells of his having healed two Buddhas in former births. Morris’s discussion of bakkula in another connection ( JPTS , 1886, p. 95 ff.) explains the word as a proper name no better than does the mythical story. 1 See Sisters, p. 17 n. The poem is repeated (CLXXX1Y.).