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IV, 18.
CONVERSION OF THE SUPPORTER ETC.
205
Desire not either life (bhava) or its opposite; the raging fire of birth, old age, and death burns up the world on every side. 1447
Seeing the constant toil (unrest) of birth and death we ought to strive to attain a passive state (no-thought), the final goal of Sammata", the place of immortality and rest. 1448
'All is empty! neither “self,” nor place for "self,” but all the world is like a phantasy; this is the way to regard ourselves, as but a heap of composite qualities (samskära).' 1449
The nobleman hearing the spoken law forthwith attained the first • degree of holiness, he emptied, as it were, the sea of birth and death, one drop alone remaining. 1450
By practising, apart from men, the banishment of all desire he soon attained the one impersonal
Sammata or Sammati seems to be the same as Samatha in Pali (concerning which, see Childers, Páli Dict. sub voce). The Chinese expression 'yih sin' (one heart) is generally equivalent to 'sammata,' ecstatic union. It cannot here be rendered by samadbi.
• The place of sweet dew' (amrita).
3 That is, of a Srotâpanna. Spence Hardy, in his Manual of Buddhism, p. 218, also says that Anathapinda da entered the first path after hearing the sermon; but in his account the sermon consisted of two stanzas only, 'He who is free from evil desire attains the highest estate and is always in prosperity. He who cuts off demerit, who subdues the mind and attains a state of perfect equanimity, secures Nirvana; this is his prosperity. In this account the idea of prosperity' is the same as the charity of Nirvana' in our version.
• This appears to allude to the circumstance that at the dedication of the Vihara Anathapindada arrived at the third degree of holiness, after which there was but one birth (drop) more to experience before reaching Nirvana (Manual of Buddhism, p. 220).
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