The Questions of King Milinda, Part II — SBE Vol. 36 (trans. T. W. Rhys Davids, 1894)

2 That is, of insight and of the practice of right conduct.

p. 57

shall overcome all the difficulties inherent therein, shall win his way even to the excellent condition of Arahatship1." [243]

' Now, Nâgasena, if a layman, clad in white robes, enjoying the pleasures of sense, dwelling in a habitation encumbered with wife and children2, making constant use of the sandal wood of Benares 3, of garlands and perfumes and unguents, accepting gold and silver, wearing a turban inlaid with jewels and gold, can, having reached the Supreme Attainment, win his way to the excellent condition of Arahatship — and if a recluse, with his shaven head and yellow robes, dependent for his livelihood on the alms of other men, perfectly fulfilling the fourfold code of morality4, taking upon himself and carrying out the hundred and fifty precepts5, conp. 58ducting himself according to the thirteen extra vows * without omitting any one of them, can also, having reached the Supreme Attainment, win his way to the excellent condition of Arahatship — then, Sir, what is the distinction between the layman and the recluse ? Your austerity is without effect, your renunciation is useless, your observance of the precepts is barren, your taking of the extra vows is vain. What is the good of your therein heaping up woes to yourselves, if thus in comfort the condition of bliss can be reached ? '

1 Sanzyutta Nikaya XLIV, 24, says Mr. Trenckner. The passage has not yet been reached in M. L£on Feer's edition for the Pali Text Society. Hina/i-kumbure (p. 341) renders way a by nirwana.

2 Literally 'a bed encumbered, &c.' See below, p. 348 of the Pali text, where the question, as here, is whether such a layman can attain to the Nirvana of Arahatship.

3 So the Buddha says of himself (Ahguttara Nikaya III, 38), that, in the days when he was a layman, he never used any sandal wood except that from Benares.

4 I don't know what these four Silakkhandhas are. Morality is described in the Pi/akas as threefold, fivefold, or tenfold, according as the Silas, in three divisions (as translated in my 'Buddhist Suttas/ vol. xi of the " Sacred Books of the East/ pp. 189-200), are referred to ; or the first five, or the whole ten, of the moral precepts (the Buddhist Ten Commandments) set out in my * Buddhism/ p. 160. This reference to four divisions of the moral code is foreign to the Pi/akas, at least as we yet know them.

5 The Diyaafa^esu sikkhapada-satesu. It is clear from the Ahguttara Nikaya III, 83 that the precepts referred to are those of the Patimokkha (translated by me at the beginning of ' Vinaya

Your austerity is without effect, your renunciation is useless, your observance of the precepts is barren, your taking of the extra vows is vain. What is the good of your therein heaping up woes to yourselves, if thus in comfort the condition of bliss can be reached ? '

1 7. ' The words you ascribe to the Blessed One, O king, are rightly quoted. And that is even so. It is the man who has reached to the Supreme Attainment who bears the palm. If the recluse, O king, because he knows that he is a recluse, should neglect the Attainments, then is he far from the fruits of renunciation, far from Arahatship — how much more if a layman, still wearing the habit of the world, should do so ! But whether he be a layman, O king, or a recluse, he who attains to the supreme insight, to the supreme conduct of life, he too will win his way to the excellent condition of Arahatship.

18. 'But nevertheless, O king, it is the recluse who is the lord and master of the fruit of renunciation. And renunciation of the world, O king, is full of gain, many and immeasurable are its advantages, its profit can no man calculate. Just, O king, as no man can put a measure, in wealth, on the

Texts/ vol. xvii of the ' Sacred Books of the East '), notwithstanding the fact that the actual number of these rules is 227.

1 The Dhutangas : see above, IV, 5, 10, and the enumeration below at the translation of p. 351 of the Pali text.

p. 59

value of a wish-conferring gem, [244] saying: "Such and such is the price of the gem', — just so, O king, is the renunciation of the world full of gain, many and immeasurable are its advantages, its profit can no man calculate — no more, O king, than he could count the number of the waves in the great ocean, and say : " So and so many are the waves in the sea ! "

19. 'Whatsoever the recluse, O king, may have yet to do, all that doth he accomplish straightway, without delay. And why is that ? The recluse, O king, is content with little, joyful in heart, detached from the world, apart from society, earnest in zeal, without a home, without a dwelling-place, righteous in conduct, in action without guile, skilled in duty and in the attainments — that is why whatsoever may lie before him yet to do, that can he accomplish straightway, without delay — just as the flight of your javelin *, O king, is rapid because it is of pure metal, smooth, and burnished, and straight, and without a stain/

' Very good, Nagasena ! That is so, and I accept it as you say/

[Here ends the dilemma as to the recluse having no advantages over the layman.]

1 Nara/fca. As Childers expresses a doubt as to the character
of this weapon, I would refer to the Ma^g^ima I, 429, Gataka III,
322, and Milinda, pp. 105, 418 (of Mr. Trenckner's text).

p. 60

[dilemma THE FIFTY-FIFTH.
ASCETICISM.]

As Childers expresses a doubt as to the character
of this weapon, I would refer to the Ma^g^ima I, 429, Gataka III,
322, and Milinda, pp. 105, 418 (of Mr. Trenckner's text).

p. 60

[dilemma THE FIFTY-FIFTH.
ASCETICISM.]

20. ' Venerable Nagasena, when the Bodisat was practising austerity *, then there was found no other exertion the like of his, no such power, no such battling against evil, no such putting to rout of the armies of the Evil One, no such abstinence in food, no such austerity of life. But finding no satisfaction in strife like that, he abandoned that idea, saying:

" Not even by this cruel asceticism am I reaching the peculiar faculty, beyond the power of man, arising from insight into the knowledge of that which is fit and noble 2. May there not be now some other way to wisdom3 ?"

' But then, when weary of that path he had by another way attained to omniscience, he, on the other hand, thus again exhorted and instructed his disciple in that path (he had left, saying) :

[245] " Exert yourselves, be strong, and to the faith

The Buddhas taught devote yourselves with zeal.

As a strong elephant a house of reeds,

Shake down the armies of the Evil One 4."

1 See 'Buddhist Birth Stories/ pp. 90, 91; and MaggMma. Nikaya I, 240-246.

2 Alamariya-dassana-#a7/a-visesatfz. I am not sure of the exact meaning of this compound. For alamariya the Sinhalese has here (p. 343) sarva^wata, and renders the whole 'do I arrive at a superhuman condition, at the distinctive faculty which is able to see into omniscience/ and on IV, 8, 2 1 it gives a slightly different but practically identical rendering, ' I shall not reach that superhuman condition which can distinguish or which suffices for insight into the supreme omniscience/

3 That is the wisdom of Buddhahood. The passage is from the Maxima Nikaya I, 246 (quoted also below, IV, 8, 21).

4 This is a very famous stanza. It is put into the mouth of

IV, 6, 22. OF MILINDA THE KING. 6 1

' Now what, Nagasena, is the reason that the Tathagata exhorted and led his disciples to that path which he had himself abandoned, which he loathed ? '