________________
THE QUESTIONS
KING
OF
MILIND A.
BOOK IV.
THE SOLVING OF DILEMMAS.
CHAPTER 5.
[DILEMMA THE FORTY-FIRST. ON DWELLING-PLACES.]
KAY
1. [211] Venerable Nâgasena, the Blessed One said:
"In friendship of the world anxiety is born,
In household life distraction's dust springs up, The state set free from home and friendship's ties, That, and that only, is the recluse's aim 1."
This is the opening verse of the Muni Sutta (in the Sutta Nipâta I, 12). It is quoted again below, p. 385 of the Pâli text. The second line is, in the original, enigmatically terse, and runs simply, 'From a home dust arises.' This Fausböll renders (in the S. B. E., vol. x, part ii, p. 33), 'From household life arises defilement,' the word for dust (rago) being often used figuratively in the sense of something that disfigures, is out of place in the higher life. It is the distracting effect of household cares that the recluse has to fear.
[36]
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