One day a wealthy merchant, accompanied by five hundred disciples of heretical teachers, went to Jetavana monastery, saluted the Exalted One, presented offerings, and sat down. Likewise did those disciples of heretical teachers salute the Teacher and sit down, close beside the merchant. And they gazed at the countenance of the Teacher, resplendent with the glory of the full moon; at his form, a form like that of Great Brahmā, adorned with the greater and lesser marks of beauty, encircled with a radiance a fathom deep; at the solid rays of a Buddha which issued from his body, forming, as it were, garland after garland and pair after pair. And to them the Teacher, as it were a young lion roaring the lion’s roar on a table-land in the Himālaya mountains, as it were a cloud thundering in the rainy season, as it were bringing down the Heavenly Ganges, as it were weaving a rope of jewels, with a voice like that of Great Brahmā, endowed with the Eight Excellences, captivating the ear, delighting the heart, preached a pleasing discourse on the Doctrine, diversified in divers ways. The heretics, after listening to the discourse of the Teacher, believed in their hearts, and rising from their seats, burst asunder the refuge of the heretical teachers and sought refuge in the Buddha. From that time on they regularly accompanied the merchant to the monastery with offerings, listened to the Doctrine, gave alms, kept the Precepts, observed Fast-day. Now the Exalted One departed from Sāvatthi and went back again to Rājagaha. When the Teacher departed, the heretics burst that refuge asunder, sought refuge once more in the heretical teachers, lapsed once more into their former position. When the Exalted One returned to Sāvatthi and learned what had happened, he said to those backsliders: “Laymen, in former times also men mistook for a refuge what was no refuge at all, grasped with the grasp of reason, with the grasp of contradiction, and in a wilderness haunted by demons came to a sorry end, becoming the food of ogres. But men who laid hold of Truth absolute, certain, consistent, obtained safety in that very wilderness.” Having so said, he became silent. Thereupon the merchant, rising from his seat, saluted and applauded the Exalted One. And joining his hands and pressing them to his head in token of reverent salutation, he spoke as follows: “Reverend Sir, it is clear to us that these laymen just now burst asunder the Supreme Refuge and chose instead speculation. But the fact that in former times, in a wilderness haunted by demons, men who chose speculation were destroyed, while men who chose Absolute Truth were saved,--that fact is hidden from us and clear to you alone. It were indeed well were the Exalted One, as it were making the full moon rise in the heavens, to make this fact clear to us.”