Page:Asoka - the Buddhist Emperor of India.djvu/68

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66
ASOKA

beast by the plantation of shade-giving and fruit-bearing trees, the digging of wells, and the erection of rest-houses and watering-places at convenient intervals along the highroads. He devoted special attention to elaborate arrangements for the care and healing of the sick, and for the cultivation and dissemination of medicinal herbs and roots in the territories of foreign allied sovereigns as well as within the limits of the empire. Although the word hospitals does not occur in the edicts, such institutions must have been included in his arrangements, and the remarkable free hospital which the Chinese pilgrim found working at Pâtaliputra six and a half centuries later doubtless was a continuation of Asoka's foundation. The curious animal hospitals which still exist at Surat and certain other cities in Western India also may be regarded as survivals of Asoka's institutions[1].

The greater part of Asoka's moral teaching is in agreement with, and may be fairly summed up in the familiar words of the Church Catechism:

'To love, honour, and succour my father and mother . . . to submit myself to all my governours, teachers, spiritual pastors and masters: to order myself lowly and reverently to all my betters: to hurt no body by word nor deed: to be true and just in all my dealing: to bear no malice nor hatred in my heart: to keep my hands from picking and stealing, and my tongue from evil-speaking, lying, and slandering . . . and to do my duty in that state of life, unto which it shall please God to call me.'

  1. Rock Edict II, Pillar Edict VII; Fa-hien, Travels, ch. xxvii; E. Hist. India, 3rd ed., pp. 183, 296.