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II2
THE QUESTIONS AND PUZZLES
IV, 7, 24.
smoke', and eclipses these are the four derangements which happen to the sun, and it is when affected by one or other of these that its heat is allayed.'
Most wonderful, Nagasena, and most strange [274] that even the sun, so transcendent in glory, should suffer from derangement-how much more then other, lesser, creatures. No one else could have made this explanation except one wise like you !'
[Here ends the dilemma as to the heat
of the sun.]
[DILEMMA THE SEVENTIETH.
THE SEASONS. 24. Venerable Nâgasena, why is it that the heat of the sun is more fierce in winter than in summer?'
In the hot season, O king, dust is blown up into clouds, and pollen * agitated by the winds rises up into the sky, and clouds multiply in the heavens, and gales blow with exceeding force. All these crowded and heaped together shut off the rays of the sun, and so in the hot season the heat of the sun is diminished. But in the cold season, O king, the earth below is at rest, the rains above are
1 Megho, literally rain-cloud.' But clouds of smoke are meant, as is clear from the parallel passage loc. cit. which has dhumarago, but see Kullavagga XII, 1, 3 (from which the whole section IV, 7, 23 is derived).
* Rahu.
: Anupahatam. Compare Dr. Morris's note in the 'Journal of the Páli Text Society,' 1884, p. 75, on Therå Gåthâ 625.
Renû. Perhaps this should again be rendered dust. See the verse at Gataka I, 117 (which is nearly the same as Divyavadana, p. 491),
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