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154
THE QUESTIONS OF KING MILINDA.
with darkness when they met you, O best of all the leaders of schools!'
IV, 1, 19.
[Here ends the question as to not consenting to honours paid '.]
[THE OMNISCIENCE OF THE BUDDHA.]
19. 'Venerable Nâgasena, was the Buddha omniscient?'
'Yes, O king, he was. But the insight of knowledge was not always and continually (consciously) present with him. The omniscience of the Blessed One was dependent on reflection.' But if he did reflect he knew whatever he wanted to know 2.
'Then, Sir, the Buddha cannot have been omniscient, if his all-embracing knowledge was reached through investigation.'
'[If so, great king, our Buddha's knowledge must have been less in degree of fineness than that of the other Buddhas. And that is a conclusion hard to draw. But let me explain a little further.] Suppose, O king, you had a hundred cart-loads of rice in the husk, and each cart-load was of seven ammanas3 and a half. Would a man without consideration be able to tell you in a moment how many laks of grains there were in the whole?'
1 This title and the subsequent ones to the various questions are added from the Simhalese. They are probably the same titles as those referred to by Mr. Trenckner in his preface as being in his Burmese MS.
So again below, § 27.
An ammana is about four bushels.
Mr. Trenckner has marked this passage as corrupt, and I do not pretend to understand it either. The Simhalese is also very
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