“Have I not power enough to be the God of Heaven?” was the arrogant reply.
“What qualifications have you?” asked Buddha. “Enumerate them.”
“My qualifications are innumerable,” replied Sun. “I am invulnerable, I am immortal, I can change myself into seventy-two different forms, I can ride on the clouds of Heaven and pass through the air at will, with one leap I can traverse a hundred and eight thousand li.”
“Well,” replied Buddha, “have a match with me; I wager that in one leap you cannot even jump out of the palm of my hand. If you succeed I will bestow upon you the sovereignty of Heaven.”
Broad-jump Competition
Sun rose into space, flew like lightning in the great vastness, and reached the confines of Heaven, opposite the five great red pillars which are the boundaries of Page 333the created universe. On one of them he wrote his name, as irrefutable evidence that he could reach this extreme limit; this done, he returned triumphant to demand of Buddha the coveted inheritance.
“But, wretch,” said Buddha, “you never went out of my hand!”
“How is that?” rejoined Sun. “I went as far as the pillars of Heaven, and even took the precaution of writing my name on one of them as proof in case of need.”
“Look then at the words you have written,” said Buddha, lifting a finger on which Sun read with stupefaction his name as he had inscribed it.