Those who have put their trust in the Truth, They will not go to a world of pain: Having put off this mortal coil, They will enter some heavenly body!
Those who have put their faith in the Order, They will not go to a world of pain: Having put off this mortal coil, They will enter some heavenly body!
They go to many a refuge — To the mountains and the forest ....
(and so on down to)
Having gone to this as their refuge, They are freed from every pain.[1]
The above was not all the discourse which the Teacher uttered to them. He also said, "Disciples! the meditation on the Buddha, the Truth, and the Order, gives the Entrance and the Fruit of the First Path, and of the Second, and of the Third, and of the Fourth." And having in this way laid down the Truth to them, he added, "You have done wrong to reject so great salvation!"
And here the fact of the gift of the Paths to those who meditate on the Buddha, the Order, and the Truth, might be shown from the following and other similar passages: "There is one thing, O mendicants, which, if practised with increasing intensity, leads to complete weariness of the vanities of the world, to the end of longings, to the destruction of excitement, to peace of mind, to higher knowledge, to complete enlightenment, to Nirvāna. What is that one thing? The meditation on the Buddhas."
Having thus exhorted the disciples in many ways, the Blessed One said, "Disciples! formerly, too, men trusting
1 This last quotation is from Dhammapada, verses 188-192.
- ↑ 1
