Trishasti Shalaka Purusa Caritra Part 1

Author(s): Hemchandracharya, Helen M Johnson
Publisher: Oriental Research Institute Vadodra

Page 302

281 done by you to him in his relation as Cakravartin will light up the relation of peerless brotherly affection. If you, fearless at the thought, 'He is my brother,' do not come, that is not fitting. Kings, whose essence is command, are not restrained by relationship. Attracted by his exceeding splendor, like iron by the loadstone, gods, men, and demons come to the Lord of Bharata. Why do you not favor merely by coming the one whom even Vasava treats as a friend by sharing his seat ? If you scorn the King, thinking yourself a hero—-verily, compared with him, you with your soldiers are a handful of meal in the ocean. Who can endure his eightyfour lacs of elephants, resembling Sakra's elephants, approaching like living mountains ? Who will make stumble so many horses and chariots inundating the earth from every direction like ocean-waves at the destruction of the world? Who is not terrified by the ninety-six crores of soldiers like lions belonging to him who is lord of ninety-six crores of villages ? Can General Suşeņa alone, attacking with a staff in his hand, like Kộtānta, be endured even by gods or demons ? Even the three worlds are a very small thing to the Cakrin Bharata possessing the unerring cakra, like a mass of darkness to the sun. The King, superior in splendor and elder by birth, is always the chief. He must be served by you, Bāhubali, if you desire your kingdom and life.”
Then Bahubali, scorning the power of the world because of the power of his arm, spoke as follows in a deep voice like another ocean: “Well done! You alone, messenger, are the first of the eloquent since you are able to utter such a speech before me. Verily, my elder brother is like my father. That he desires relatives to meet, that is certainly very fitting. We did not go, thinking, 'He, resplendent with the magnificence of gods, demons, and kings, will be ashamed of us of little power, if we go. His intentness on seizing