Mahavira His Life And Teachings

Author(s): Saraswati Raghavachari
Publisher: Jain Sastu Sahitya

Page 30

21
· She began to plead with him against the idea of renunciation. He was too young, too delicate, too inexperienced for the hard life of a SANYASIN, she said. Her motherly eye could never behold him practising the austerities of penance and prayer.
Mahavira tried to impress upon her mind the great truths about the emptiness of worldly pleasure, the supremacy of the Spirit over the body, the great goal of NIRVANA and the necessity of renunciation for its attainment.
But she advanced the argument of tears which he could hardly meet. He agreed not to become a Sanyasin during the life-time of both his parents.
CHAPTER XIV
Not Yet !
Patience, my Lord! why, it is the soul
of peace; Of all the virtues, it is nearest kin to Heaven; It makes men look like gods; the best of men; That ever wore earth about him, was a
sufferer; A Soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit, The first true gentleman that ever breathed.
-DeckER.