Buddhlim in India 31 Book of Revelation. Clearly this passage is the work of a writer whose attitude approached closely to that of MahaySna, but it must be remembered that Theravida Buddhists look on the text from which it is taken as semi-canonical. The builder of a city . . . first chooses a pleasant and suitable site; he makes it smooth, and then sets to work to build his city fair and well proportioned, divided into quarters, with ramparts round about it . . . . And when the city is built, and stands complete and perfect, he goes away to another land. And in time the city becomes rich and prosperous, peaceful and happy, free from plague and calamity, and filled with people of all classes and professions and of all lands . . . even with Scythians, Greeks, and Chinese . ... All these folk coming to live in the new city and finding it so well planned, faultless, perfect, and beautiful exclaim: “Skilled indeed must be the builder who built this city!” So the Lord . . . in his infinite goodness . . . when he had achieved the highest powers of Buddhahood and had conquered Mara^ and his hosts, tearing the net of false doctrine, casting aside ignorance, and producing wisdom, . . . built the City of Righteousness. The Lord’s City of Righteousness has virtue for its ramparts, fear of sin for its moat, knowledge for its gates, zeal tor its turrets, faith for its pillars, concentration for its watchman, wisdom for its palaces. The Basket of Discourses is its marketplace, the Supplementary Doctrines its roads, the Conduct its court of justice, and earnest self-control is its main street . . . . The Lord laid down the following subjects for meditation: the ideas of impermanence, of the nonexistence of an enduring self, of the impurity and of the wretchedness of life, of ridding oneself of evil tendencies, of passionlessness, of stopping the influx of evil tendencies, of dissatisfaction with all things in the world, of the impermanence of all conditioned things, of mindful control of breath, of the corpse in disintegration, of the execution of criminals with all its horrors; the ideas of friendliness, of compassion, of joy, of * The spirit of the world and the flesh, the Buddhist Satan.

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Buddhlim in India 31

Book of Revelation. Clearly this passage is the work of a writer whose attitude approached closely to that of MahaySna, but it must be remembered that Theravida Buddhists look on the text from which it is taken as semi-canonical.

The builder of a city . . . first chooses a pleasant and suitable site; he makes it smooth, and then sets to work to build his city fair and well proportioned, divided into quarters, with ramparts round about it. . . . And when the city is built, and stands complete and perfect, he goes away to another land. And in time the city becomes rich and prosperous, peaceful and happy, free from plague and calamity, and filled with people of all classes and professions and of all lands . . . even with Scythians, Greeks, and Chinese. . . . All these folk coming to live in the new city and finding it so well planned, faultless, perfect, and beautiful exclaim: “Skilled indeed must be the builder who built this city!”

So the Lord . . . in his infinite goodness . . . when he had achieved the highest powers of Buddhahood and had conquered Mara^ and his hosts, tearing the net of false doctrine, casting aside ignorance, and producing wisdom, . . . built the City of Righteousness.

T he Lord’s City of Righteousness has virtue for its ramparts, fear of sin for its moat, knowledge for its gates, zeal tor its turrets, faith for its pillars, concentration for its watchman, wisdom for its palaces. The Basket of Discourses is its marketplace, the Supplementary Doctrines its roads, the Conduct its court of justice, and earnest self-control is its main street. . . .

T he Lord laid down the following subjects for meditation: the ideas of impermanence, of the nonexistence of an enduring self, of the impurity and of the wretchedness of life, of ridding oneself of evil tendencies, of passionlessness, of stopping the influx of evil tendencies, of dissatisfaction with all things in the world, of the impermanence of all conditioned things, of mindful control of breath, of the corpse in disintegration, of the execution of criminals with all its horrors; the ideas of friendliness, of compassion, of joy, of

* The spirit of the world and the flesh, the Buddhist Satan.