'whether a butterfly became myself or whether I became a butterfly.' Once, when gathered together men imagined that they saw wasps in the place, and again coming together they were perplexed on finding caterpillars there[1]. One compares Chaos with a bird's egg (anda), or Darkness with the state of an embryo (or infancy).
These people do not as yet realise that birth is in consequence of the grasping condition of mind and heart (Trishnâ. 'thirst'), and that our present existence is due to our former actions (Karma). Are they not thus plunged and floating in the sea of suffering, borne to and fro, as it were, by the stream of error?
It is only our Great Teacher, the highest of the world (Lokagyeshtha), the Sakya, who has himself pointed out an easy path, teaching an admirable principle, he who has explained the twelve chains of causation (Nidâna)[2] and acquired the eighteen matchless qualities (Dharma)[3], who has called himself the teacher of gods and men (Sâstâ Devamanushyânâm), or the Omniscient One (Sarvagña); he alone has led the four classes of living beings[4] out of the House of Fire (the world), and delivered the three stages[5] of existence from abiding in Darkness. He has crossed over the stream of Klesa (passion), and ascended to the shore of Nirvâna.
When our Sage first attained to Buddhahood on the Dragon River
- ↑ This is a famous simile in China. When caterpillars have young ones, wasps come and carry them off, and this has given rise to the belief that caterpillars are changed into wasps. 小補韻會 gives this story.
- ↑ For the twelve Nidânas, see Prof. Oldenberg's Buddha, &c., chap. ii.
- ↑ These are perfect deed, speech, and thought; knowledge of past, present, and future; Pragnâ, Moksha, calm mind, and the like.
- ↑ I.e. Those born of the womb (1), of eggs (2), from moisture (3), or miraculously (4). The fourth 'miraculously born' is aupapâduka in the Northern Buddhist texts; this is a misrepresentation of the Pâli Opapâtiko. See Childers, s. v., and Burnouf, Lotus, p. 394. Cf. Vagrakkhedikâ III, S. B. E., vol. xlix, p. 113. The fourth is generally udbhigga, i.e. 'produced from sprouts,' but not so with the Buddhists.
- ↑ The three stages of existence: (1) the world of passion (kâma); (2) the world of form (rûpa); (3) the world without form (arûpa). See bhavo, Childers.
