When the Bodhisattva, as the Buddha is so designated prior to his attainment of Buddhahood, was meditating in seclusion, the following consideration came upon him: “Verily this world has fallen upon trouble (_kiccha_), one is born, and grows old, and dies, and falls from one state, and springs up in another. And from this suffering, moreover, no one knows of any way of escape, even from decay and death. O when shall a way of escape from this suffering be made known, from decay and death?” Thus thinking, the Bodhisattva reasoned out that decay and death arose from birth, birth from becoming, becoming from grasping, grasping from craving, until he came to the mutual conditioning of name-and-form (_namarūpa_) and cognition (_viññāna_).[f50] Then he reasoned back and forth from the coming-to-be of this entire body of evil to its final ceasing-to-be,—and at this thought there arose to the Bodhisattva an insight (_cakkhu_)[f51] into things not heard of before, and knowledge arose, and reason arose, wisdom arose, light arose. (_Bodhisattassa pubbe ananussutesu dhammesu cakkhuṁ udapādi, ñāṇaṁ udapādi, paññā udapādi, vijjā udapādi, āloka udapādi._)” He then exclaimed: “I have penetrated this Dharma, deep, hard to perceive, hard to understand, calm, sublime, no mere dialectic, subtle, intelligible only to the wise. (_Dhammo gambhīro duddaso duranubodho santo panito atakkāvacaro nipuṇo pandito vedanīyo._) But this is a race devoting itself to the things to which it clings, devoted thereto, delighting therein. And for a race devoting itself to the things to which it clings, devoted thereto, delighting therein, this were a matter hard to perceive, to wit, that this is conditioned by that, and all that happens is by way of cause. This too were a matter hard to discern:—the tranquillisation of all the activities of life, the renunciation of all substrata of rebirth, the destruction of craving, the death of passion, quietude of heart, Nirvana.” The Buddha then uttered the following verse in which he expressed his reluctance to preach the Dharma to the world at large—the Dharma which was realised in him by ñāṇa,—which he saw visibly, face to face, without any traditional instruction: “This that through many toils I’ve won— Enough! why should I make it known? By folk with lust and hate consumed Not this the Truth[f52] that can be grasped! Against the stream of common thought. Deep, subtle, difficult, delicate. Unseen ’twill be by passion’s slaves Cloaked in the murk of Ignorance.”[f53]