The Gâtakamâlâ; Or, Garland of Birth-StoriesAryasura
Religion
The Gâtakamâlâ; Or, Garland of Birth-Stories
Aryasura
Gautama Buddha -- Pre-existence
11. 'If, either by attachment or from apathy, I should not go of my own
accord now, as I needs must, after the honourable hospitality shown to
me has lost its beauty, having become an ordinary one, verily, would it
not hereafter come to the point that I should be seized by the neck and
turned out?
12. 'Not with a heart sore with hatred am I about to leave you, but
considering this the proper course to follow now. Former benefits are
not effaced from the heart of the pious by the stroke of one affront.
13. 'But an ill-disposed man is not fit to be had for a patron, no more
than a dried-up pond will serve him who is in want of water. If profit
may be gained from the side of such a one, it requires much care to
acquire it, and the result will be meagre and not unmixed.
14. 'He, however, who desires ease and dislikes trouble, must attend
only on such a patron who has composed his mind and by his placidity
resembles a great lake of pure water in autumn. So is the well-known
line of conduct approved of men.
15. 'Further, he who is averse to one intent on showing his attachment;
likewise he who, attending on somebody who dislikes him, afflicts
himself; thirdly, he who is slow in remembering former benefits--such
persons bear only the shape of a man and raise doubts as to their real
nature.
16. 'Friendship is destroyed both by lack of intercourse and profusion
of attentions, also by frequent requests. Therefore, desiring to protect
this remnant of our affection from the dangers of my residing here, I
now take my leave.'
The king said: 'If Your Reverence has a strong determination to go,
thinking your departure to be indispensable, pray, deign to favour us by
coming back here again, will you? Friendship ought to be kept safe also
from the fault of lack of intercourse, did you not say so?' The
Bodhisattva replied: 'Your Majesty, sojourning in the world is something
subject to many hindrances, for a great many adversaries in the shape of
various calamities attend it. Thus considering, I cannot make the
positive promise, that I shall come again. I can only express my wish to
see you another time, when there may be some indispensable reason for
coming.' Having in this way appeased the king, who dismissed him in the
most honourable manner, he set off from his realm, and feeling his mind
troubled by intercourse with people living in the world, took up his
abode in some forest-place. Staying there, he directed his mind to the
exercise of meditation and before long came to the possession of the
four ecstatic trances (dhyâna) and the five kinds of transcendent
knowledge (abhi_gñ_â).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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