On every side were fields of living green,
With gardens, groves and gently rising hills,
Where crystal streams of living waters flow,
And dim with distance Meru's lofty heights.
No desert sands, no mountains crowned with ice,
For here the scorching simoom never blows,
Nor wintry winds, that pierce and freeze and kill,
But gentle breezes breathing sweet perfumes;
No weeds, no thorns, no bitter poisonous fruits,
No noxious reptiles and no prowling beasts;
For in this world of innocence and love
No evil thoughts give birth to evil things,
But many birds of every varied plume
Delight the ear with sweetest melody;
And many flowers of every varied tint
Fill all the air with odors rich and sweet;
And many fruits, suited to every taste,
Hang ripe and ready that who will may eat—
A world of life, with all its lights and shades,
The bright original of our sad world
Without its sin and storms, its thorns and tears.
No Lethe's sluggish waters lave its shores,
Nor solemn shades, of poet's fancy bred,
Sit idly here to boast of battles past,
Nor wailing ghosts wring here their shadowy hands
For lack of honor to their cast-off dust;
But living men, in human bodies clothed—
Not bodies made of matter, dull and coarse,
Dust from the dust and soon to dust returned,
But living bodies, clothing living souls,
Bodies responsive to the spirit's will,
Clothing in acts the spirit's inmost thoughts—
Dwell here in many mansions, large and fair,
Stretching beyond the keenest vision's hen,
With room for each and more than room for all,
Forever filling and yet never full.
Not clogged by matter, fast as fleetest birds,
Wishing to go, they go; to come, they come.
No helpless infancy or palsied age,
But all in early manhood's youthful bloom,
The old grown young, the child to man's estate.
Gentle they seemed as they passed to and fro,
Gentle and strong, with every manly grace;
Busy as bees in summer's sunny hours,
In works of usefulness and acts of love;
No pinching poverty or grasping greed,
Gladly receiving, they more gladly give,
Sharing in peace the bounties free to all.
As lost in wonder and delight he gazed,
He saw approaching from a pleasant grove
Two noble youths, yet full of gentleness,
Attending one from sole to crown a queen,
With every charm of fresh and blooming youth
And every grace of early womanhood,
Her face the mirror of her gentle soul,
Her flowing robes finer than softest silk,
That as she moved seemed woven of the light;
Not borne by clumsy wings, or labored steps,
She glided on as if her will had wings
That bore her willing body where she wished.
As she approached, close by her side he saw,
As through a veil or thin transparent mist,
The form and features of the aged king,
Older and frailer by six troubled years
Than when they parted, yet his very face,
Whom she was watching with the tenderest care.
And nearer seen each seeming youth was two,
As when at first in Eden's happy shade
Our primal parents ere the tempter came
Were twain, and yet but one, so on they come,
Hand joined in hand, heart beating close to heart,
One will their guide and sharing every thought,
Beaming with tender, all-embracing love,
Whom God had joined and death had failed to part.
What need of words to introduce his guests?
Love knows her own, the mother greets her son.
Her parents and the king's, who long had watched
Their common offspring with a constant care,
Inspiring hope and breathing inward peace
When secret foes assailed on every side,
Now saw him burst the clouds that veiled their view
And stand triumphant full before their eyes.
O happy meeting! joy profound, complete!
Soul greeting soul, heart speaking straight to heart,
While countless happy faces hovered near
And song's of joy sound through Nirvana's heights.
At length, the transports of first meeting past,
More of this new-found world he wished to see,
More of its peace and joy he wished to know.
Led by his loving guides, enwrapt he saw
Such scenes of beauty passing human speech,
Such scenes of peace and joy past human thought,
That he who sings must tune a heavenly lyre
And seraphs touch his lips with living fire.
My unanointed lips will not presume
To try such lofty themes, glad if I gain
A distant prospect of the promised land,
And catch some glimpses through the gates ajar.
Long time he wandered through these blissful scenes,
Time measured by succession of delights,
Till wearied by excess of very joy
Both soul and body sunk in tranquil sleep.
He slept while hosts of devas sweetly sung:
"Hail, great physician! savior, lover, friend!
Joy of the worlds, guide to Nirvana, hail!"
From whose bright presence Mara's myriads fled.
But Mara's self, subtlest of all, fled not,
But putting on a seeming yogi's form,
Wasted, as if by fasts, to skin and bone,
On one foot standing, rooted to the ground,
The other raised against his fleshless thigh,
Hands stretched aloft till joints had lost their use,
And clinched so close, as if in firm resolve,
The nails had grown quite through the festering palms,[5]
His tattered robes, as if worn out by age,
Hanging like moss from trees decayed and dead,
While birds were nesting in his tangled hair.
And thus disguised the subtle Mara stood,
And when the master roused him from his sleep
His tempter cried in seeming ecstasy:
"O! happy wakening! joy succeeding grief!
Peace after trouble! rest that knows no end!
Life after death! Nirvana found at last!
Here let us wait till wasted by decay
The body's worn-out fetters drop away."
"Much suffering-brother," Buddha answered him,
"The weary traveler, wandering through the night
In doubt and darkness, gladly sees the dawn.
The storm-tossed sailor on the troubled sea,
Wearied and drenched, with joy re-enters port.
But other nights succeed that happy dawn,
And other seas may toss that sailor's bark.
But he who sees Nirvana's sacred Sun,
And in Nirvana's haven furls his sails,
No more shall wander through the starless night,
No more shall battle with the winds and waves.
O joy of joys! our eyes have seen that Sun!
Our sails have almost reached that sheltering port,
But shall we, joyful at our own escape,
Leave our poor brothers battling with the storm,
Sails rent, barks leaking, helm and compass lost,
No light to guide, no hope to cheer them on?"
"Each for himself must seek, as we have sought,"
The tempter said, "and each must climb alone
The rugged path our weary feet have trod.
No royal road leads to Nirvana's rest;
No royal captain guides his army there.
Why leave the heights with so much labor gained?
Why plunge in darkness we have just escaped?
Men will not heed the message we may bring.
The great will scorn, the rabble will deride,[6]
And cry 'He hath a devil and is mad.'"
"True," answered Buddha, "each must seek to find;
Each for himself must leave the downward road;
Each for himself must choose the narrow path
That leads to purity and peace and life.
But helping hands will aid those struggling up;
A warning voice may check those hasting down.
Men are like lilies in yon shining pool:
Some sunk in evil grovel in the dust,
Loving like swine to wallow in the mire—
Like those that grow within its silent depths,
Scarce raised above its black and oozy bed;
While some love good, and seek the purest light,
Breathing sweet fragrance from their gentle lives—
Like those that rise above its glassy face,
Sparkling with dewdrops, royally arrayed,
Drinking the brightness of the morning sun,
Distilling odors through the balmy air;
But countless multitudes grope blindly on,
Shut out from light and crushed by cruel castes,
Willing to learn, whom none will deign to teach,
Willing to rise, whom none will deign to guide,
Who from the cradle to the silent grave,
Helpless and hopeless, only toil and weep—
Like those that on the stagnant waters float,
Smothered with leaves, covered with ropy slime,
That from the rosy dawn to dewy eve
Scarce catch one glimmer of the glorious sun.
The good scarce need, the bad will scorn, my aid;
But these poor souls will gladly welcome help.
Welcome to me the scorn of rich and great,
Welcome the Brahman's proud and cold disdain,
Welcome revilings from the rabble rout,
If I can lead some groping souls to light—
If I can give some weary spirits rest.
Farewell, my brother, you have earned release—
Rest here in peace. I go to aid the poor."
And as he spoke a flash of lurid light
Shot through the air, and Buddha stood alone—
Alone! to teach the warring nations peace!
Alone! to lead a groping world to light!
Alone! to give the heavy-laden rest!
[1]A sakwal was a sun with its system of worlds, which the ancient Hindoos believed extended one beyond another through infinite space. It indicates great advance in astronomical knowledge when such a complex idea, now universally received as true, as that the fixed stars are suns with systems of worlds like ours, could be expressed in a single word.
[2]It may seem like an anachronism to put the very words of the modern agnostic into the mouth of Buddha's tempter, but these men are merely threshing over old straw. The sneer of Epicurus curled the lip of Voltaire, and now merely breaks out into a broad laugh on the good-natured face of Ingersoll.
[3]The Sanscrit, the most perfect of all languages, and the mother of Greek and of all the languages of the Aryan races, now spread over the world, had gone out of use in Buddha's time, and the Pali, one of its earliest offspring, was used by the great teacher and his people.