With reverent obeisance and reverent hearts, the Brethren entered and took their seats around him, encompassing him as it were within an orange curtain. Then in tones as of Maha-Brahma the Master [502] said, "Brethren, a Brother should not harbour the three evil thoughts,--lust, hatred and cruelty. Never let it be imagined that wicked desires are a trivial matter. For such desires are like an enemy; and an enemy is no trivial matter, but, given opportunity, works only destruction. Even so a desire, though small at its first arising, has only to be allowed to grow, in order to work utter destruction. Desire is like poison in food, like the itch in the skin, like a viper, like the thunderbolt of Indra, ever to be shunned, ever to be feared. Whensoever desire arises, forthwith, without

finding a moment's harbourage in the heart, it should be expelled by thought and reflection,--like as a raindrop rolls at once off the leaf of the lotus. The wise of former times so hated even a slight desire that they crushed it out before it could grow larger." And so saying, he told this story of the past.

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