44, 45. 'Thy true feeling was not hidden from me, pure-hearted king; so I have but rendered thee these eyes of thine. And by means of them thou wilt have the unencumbered power of seeing in all directions over one hundred of yoganas, even beyond mountains.'
Having said these words, Sakra disappeared on the spot.
Then the Bodhisattva, followed by his officials[35], whose wide-opened and scarcely winking eyes indicated the astonishment that filled their minds, went up in procession to his capital. That town exhibited a festival attire, being adorned with hoisted flags and manifold banners, the citizens looking on and the Brâhmans praising the monarch with hails and benedictions. When he had seated himself in his audience-hall, in the midst of a great crowd, made up of the ministers in the first place, of Brâhmans and elders, townsmen and countrymen, all of whom had come to express their respectful congratulations; he preached the Law to them, taking for his text the account of his own experience.
46-48. 'Who in the world, then, should be slow in satisfying the wants of the mendicants with his wealth, who has beheld how I have obtained these eyes of mine, endowed with divine power, in consequence of charity-gathered merit? In the circumference of one hundred of yoganas I see everything, though hidden by many mountains, as distinctly as if it were near. What means of attaining bliss is superior to charity, distinguished by commiseration with others and modesty? since I, by giving away my human eyesight, have got already in this world a superhuman and divine vision.
49. 'Understanding this, Sibis, make your riches fruitful by gifts and by spending[36]. This is the path leading to glory and future happiness both in this world and in the next.
50. 'Wealth is a contemptible thing, because it is pithless; yet it has one virtue, that it can be given away by him who aims at the welfare of the creatures; for if given away, it becomes a treasure (nidhâna), otherwise its ultimate object is only death (nidhana).'
So, then, it is by means of hundreds of difficult hardships that the Lord obtained this excellent Law for our sake; for this reason its preaching is to be heard with attention. This story is also to be told on account of the high-mindedness of the Tathâgata, just as the foregoing[37]. Likewise when discoursing of compassion, and when demonstrating the result of meritorious actions appearing already in this world: 'in this manner the merit, gathered by good actions, shows already here (in this world) something like the blossom of its power, the charming flowers of increasing glory.'
In the list of the contents of the Avadânakalpalatâ which Somendra added to that poem of his father Kshemendra, I do not find our avadâna, unless it should happen to be included in No. 91, which deals with a king of the Sibis. But the edition which is being published in the Bibl. Indica is not yet so far advanced. For the rest, like the story of the tigress, it is alluded to in the second pallava, verse 108: 'And in my Sibi-birth I gave away both my eyes to a blind man, and with (the gift of) my body preserved a pigeon from the danger caused by a falcon.'