"Like as the dew upon the grass, when the sun rises hot,
So is the life of mortal men: O mother, stay me not!"

When he had said this, she begged him again and again to the same effect. Then the Great Being addressed his father in the eighth stanza:

"Let those that bear this litter, lift: let not my mother stay
Me, mighty king! from entering upon my holy way ."

When the king heard his son's words, he said, "Go, lady, in your litter, back to our palace of Perennial Delight." At his words her feet failed her: and surrounded with her company of women, she departed, and entered the palace, and stood looking towards the Hall of Judgement, and wondering what news of her son. After his mother's departure the Bodhisatta again asked leave of his father. The king could not refuse him, and said, "Have thy will, then, dear son, and renounce the world."

When this consent was gained, the Bodhisatta's youngest brother, Prince Yudhitthila, greeted his father, and likewise asked leave to follow the religious life, and the king consented. Both brothers bade their father farewell, and having now renounced worldly lusts departed from the Hall of Judgement, amidst a great company of people. The queen looking upon the Great Being cried weeping, "My son has renounced the world, and the city of Ramma will be empty!" Then she repeated a couple of stanzas:

"Make haste, and bless thee! empty now is Rammaka, I trow:
King Sabbadatta has allowed Yuvanjana to go.

[123] "The eldest of a thousand, he, like gold to look upon,
This mighty prince has left the world the yellow robe to don."

The Bodhisatta did not at once embrace the religious life. No, he first bade farewell to his parents; then taking with him his youngest brother, Prince Yudhitthila, he left the city, and sending back the great

multitude which followed them, they both made their way to Himalaya. There in a delightsome spot they built a hermitage, and embraced the life of a holy sage, and cultivating the transcendent rapture of meditation, they lived all their lives long upon the fruits and roots of the forest, and became destined for the world of Brahma.

This matter is explained in the stanza of perfect wisdom which comes last:

"Yuvanjana, Yudhitthila, in holy life remain:
Their father and their mother left, they break in two death's chain."

When the Master had ended this discourse, he said, "This is not the first time, Brethren, that the Tathagata renounced a kingdom to follow the religious life, but it was the same before;" then he identified the Birth:--"At that time members of the present king's family were the father and mother, Ananda was Yudhitthila, and I was Yuvanjana myself."

Footnotes