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THE QUESTIONS OF KING MILINDA. IV, 3, 30.
or gravy-or as fine, subtle, minute, dusty grains of sand do, through the fingers, if you close your fist on them or as rice will escape sometimes when you have taken it into your fingers, and are putting it into your mouth.'
30. Well, let that be so, Någasena. I admit that the rock was intercepted. But the splinter ought at least to have paid as much respect to the Buddha as the earth did.'
There are these twelve kinds of persons, O king, who pay no respect-the lustful man in his lust, and the angry man in his malice, and the dull man in his stupidity, and the puffed-up man in his pride, and the bad man in his want of discrimination, and the obstinate man in his want of docility, and the mean man in his littleness, and the talkative man in his vanity, and the wicked man in his cruelty, and the wretched man in his misery, and the gambler [181] because he is overpowered by greed, and the busy man in his search after gain. But that splinter, just as it was broken off by the impact of the rocks, fell by chance' in such a direction that it struck against the foot of the Blessed One-just as fine, subtle, and minute grains of sand, when carried away by the force of the wind, are sprinkled down by chance in any direction they may happen to take. If the splinter, O king, had not been separated from the rock of which it formed a part, it too would have been intercepted by their meeting together. But, as it was, it was neither fixed on the earth, nor did it remain stationary in the air, but fell whithersoever
Animitta-kata-disa, which the Simhalese (p. 238) merely repeats.
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