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AHIMSA
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viction that if foreign made clothes would be used and sold here, this country will starve for want of industry. If such a patriot monk is supplied with a foreign cloth for which he has not himself made any effort, nor he has induced others to make it, nor he has any notion of its making, he would not accept it, because his approval and his acceptance would be detrimental to the interests of the country he loves, Similarly acceptance of flesh is to give support to the practice of killing dumb creatures. In Ceylon I found some monks eating flesh on the ground that it is eatable because they were not guilty of killing the creatures in any way, while I saw some monks who do not eat it, But this belief, that if they do not kill animals nor cause to kill them, nor suppose to kill them then they would not be guilty of any injury if they accept flesh in alms, is prevalent in Ceylon, Burma, Siam and other countries where there are larger numbers of Buddhists. But in my opinion, this belief is not right, because the sellers of Aesh in the market kill lambs, goats, fowls, fishes only for their sake. They sell it for money which is paid by the buyers. Therefore the buyers cannot be free from the sin of killing the dumb creatures.
In Vidyalankara College, Kelaniya, I saw a Chinese layman Mr. Wong Mow Lam, 19 Hard Road, Shanghai who was studying there. On consulting with him, it was known that this Lankavatâra Sutra is believed to be the authoritative book by the Buddhists of China
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