The merchant asking who was there, she replied, "It is I, great merchant, the blind and foolish fairy who lived over your fourth gateway. In the greatness of my infatuate folly I knew not the virtues of a Buddha, and so came to say what I said to you some days ago. Pardon me my fault! At the instance of Sakka, king of Devas, I have made atonement by recovering the eighteen crores owing to you, the eighteen crores which had been washed down into the sea, and another eighteen crores which were lying unowned in such and such a place,--making fifty-four crores in all, which I have poured into your empty treasure-chambers. The sum you expended on the Monastery at Jetavana is now made up again. Whilst I have nowhere to dwell, I am in misery. Bear not in mind what I did in my ignorant folly, great merchant, but pardon me."

Anatha-pindika, hearing what she said, thought to himself, "She is a fairy, and she says she has atoned, and confesses her fault. The Master shall consider this and make his virtues. known to her. I will take her before the All-Enlightened Buddha." So he said, "My good fairy, if you want me to pardon you, ask me in the presence of the master." "Very good," said she, "I will. Take me along with you to the Master." "Certainly," said he. And early in the morning, when night was just passing away, he took her with him to the Master, and told the Blessed One all that she had done.

Hearing this, the Master said, "You see, householder, how the sinful man regards sin [231] as excellent before it ripens to its fruit. But when it has ripened, then he sees sin to be sin. Likewise the good man looks on his goodness

as sin before it ripens to its fruit; but when it ripens, he sees it to be goodness." And so saying, he repeated these two stanzas from the Dhammapada:--

The sinner thinks his sinful deed is good,
So long as sin has ripened not to fruit.
But when his sin at last to ripeness grows,
The sinner surely sees "'twas sin I wrought."

The good man thinks his goodness is but sin,
So long as it has ripened not to fruit.
But when his goodness unto ripeness grows,
The good man surely sees "'twas good I wrought ."

At the close of these stanzas that fairy was established in the Fruit of the First Path. She fell at the Wheel-marked feet of the Master, crying, "Stained as I was with passion, depraved by sin, misled by delusion, and blinded by ignorance, I spoke wickedly because I knew not your virtues. Pardon me!" Then she received pardon from the Master and from the great merchant.