But his brothers, hearing him speak of the homeless life, felt their hearts grieved with the apprehension of separation. Their faces grew wet with tears of sorrow, and respectfully bowing they spoke to him: 'The wound caused by the sorrow-arrow of our father's decease is not yet healed. Pray do not rub it open afresh with the salt of this new assault of grief.
5. 'Even now the wound is still open which was inflicted on our minds by the death of our father. Oh! you must retract your resolution, wise brother, you must not strew salt on our wound.
6. 'Or, if indeed you are convinced that attachment to the house is unfit, or that the happiness of the forest-life is the road to salvation, why is it that you desire to depart for the forest alone, leaving us in this house destitute of our protector?
'For this reason, the state of life which is yours, that will be ours, too. We too will renounce the world.'
The Bodhisattva answered:
7. 'People who have not familiarised themselves with Detachment cannot but follow after worldly desires. As a rule they look upon it as the same thing to give up the world or to fall over a precipice.
'Thus considering, I restrained myself and did not exhort you to adopt the homeless life, though knowing the difference between both states. But if my choice please you too, why, let us abandon our home!' And so all seven brothers, with their sister as the eighth, gave up their wealthy estate and precious goods, took leave of their weeping friends, kinsmen and relations, and resorted to the state of homeless ascetics. And with them, out of affection also one comrade, one male, and one female servant set out for the forest.
In a certain place in the forest there was a large lake of pure, blue water. It exhibited a resplendent fiery beauty, when its lotus-beds were expanded, and offered a gay aspect, when its groups of waterlilies disclosed their calyxes[141]; swarms of bees were always humming there. On the shore of that lake they built as many huts of leaves as they numbered, one for each, placing them at some distance from one another, hidden in the shadow of the trees in the midst of a lovely solitude. There they lived, devoted to their self-imposed vows and observances, and having their minds bound to meditation. On each fifth day they were in the habit of going to the Bodhisattva in order to listen to his preaching of the Law. Then he delivered some or other edifying discourse to show them the way of tranquillity and placidity of mind. In those discourses he exhorted to meditation, asserted the sinfulness of worldly pleasures, expatiated on the sense of satisfaction which is the result of detachment, blamed hypocrisy, loquacity, idleness and other vices, and made a deep impression on his audience.
Now, their maid-servant, prompted by respect and affection, did not cease to attend upon them still in the forest. She was wont to draw eatable lotus-stalks out of the lake and to put equal shares of them upon large lotus-leaves in a clean place on the lake-shore; when she had thus prepared the meal, she would announce the time by taking two pieces of wood and clashing them against each other, after which she withdrew. Then those holy men, after performing the proper and usual prayers and libations, would come to the lake-side one after another according to their age, and each having taken successively his share of the stalks, return to his hut. There they would enjoy the meal in the prescribed manner and pass the rest of the time absorbed in meditation. By this practice they avoided seeing each other, except at preaching-time.
Such irreproachable morals, way of living, and behaviour, such love of detachment, and such proneness to meditation made them renowned everywhere. Sakra, the Lord of the Devas, having heard of their reputation, came to their abode for the purpose of trying them. Now, when he perceived their disposition to meditation, their purity from bad actions, their freedom from lusts and the constancy of their serene calmness, his high opinion of their virtues grew stronger, and he became the more anxious to try them.