But the king, as he was deeply attached to the false lore he professed, also because the extent of his sin was large, felt uneasy on hearing that account of the other world, and spoke: 'Why, great _Ri_shi, 16. 'If the next world is not that (well-known) bugbear for children, or if thou judgest it fit for me to believe in it, well, lend me five hundred nishkas[207] here, and I shall give thee back one thousand in the next existence.' [207] A nishka is a gold coin, whose value varied at different times. Now when the king, according to his habitual boldness, had uttered without scruple this unbecoming language, which was as it were the vomiting of the poison of his wrong belief, the Bodhisattva answered him in a very proper way. 17. 'Still in this world those who wish to employ their money, in order to augment it, do not make any loan at all to a wicked person or a glutton or a blockhead or a sluggard. For wealth going to such persons, tends to their ruin. 18. 'But if they see one bashful, with thoroughly subdued senses, and skilled in business, to such a one they offer a loan, even unwitnessed. Such a bestowal of money produces bliss. 19. 'The very same line of conduct must be followed, O king, with respect to a debt payable in the world hereafter. But it is not suitable to contract such a loan with thee who art a person of a wicked behaviour because of the evil doctrine thou professest. 20. 'For, at the time when, being precipitated into hell by thy own cruel actions originating in the sin of a wicked lore, thou wilt lie there, sore with pains and paralysed in thy mental powers, who would then call upon thee for a debt of one thousand nishkas? 21. 'There the regions of the sky do not shine in their full feminine beauty[208] by the beams of sun and moon, the destroyers of their veil of darkness. Nor is the firmament there seen with its ornament of crowds of stars, like a lake embellished by unclosed waterlilies. [208] The di_s_a_h_ belong grammatically, and for this reason also mythologically, to the females. Hence they are spoken of as women (digaṅganâ_h_). 22. 'The place where the unbelievers dwell in the next world, is encompassed with thick darkness, and an icy wind prevails there, penetrating to the very bones and extremely painful. Who, being wise, would enter that hell in order to obtain money? 23. 'Some wander for a long time on the bottom of the hell, which is wrapt in dense obscurity and dull with pungent smoke; they are afflicted there, drawing along their rags fastened with leather thongs, and crying with pain as often as they tumble over each other. 24. 'Likewise others are running with wounded feet again and again in all directions in the Hell _G_valatkukûla [ = Flaming Chaff], longing for deliverance from thence, but they do not attain the end of their sin nor of their life.