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186
THE QUESTIONS AND PUZZLES
IV,8,61.
[DILEMMA THE EIGHTIETH.
THE OUTWARD FORM OF NIRVANA.] 61. Venerable Nâgasena, this Nirvana that you are always talking of—can you make clear by metaphor, or explanation, or reason, or argument, the form, or figure, or duration", or measure of it?'
[316] ‘Nirvana, O king, has nothing similar to it. By no metaphor, or explanation, or reason, or argument can its form, or figure, or duration, or measure be made clear.'
That I cannot believe, Nagasena,—that of Nirvana, which really after all is a condition that exists?, it should be so impossible in any way to make us understand either the form, or figure, or duration, or measure! Give me some explanation of this.'
62. Very well, O king, I will do so. Is there such a thing, O king, as the great ocean?'
“Yes, the ocean exists.'
"Well, suppose some one were to ask you, saying : “How much water is there, your majesty, in the sea, and how many are the creatures that dwell therein ?" When that question had been put, how would you answer him ?'
'I should reply thus to such a question: "My good fellow ! this is an unaskable thing that you ask me. No one ought to ask such a question. It
* So the Pali (vayam). But the Simhalese has wâ saya, dwelling-place,' throughout $$ 56 and 57.
. Atthi-dham massa nibbanassa. The Simhalese, p. 450. translates the form, &c., of the quality (dharma) of Nirvana as if the Pali were nibbana-dhammassa. But see next page, note 2.
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