“Enter in, friend Subaddha. The Blessed One gives you leave.”
And speaking respectfully that mendicant put his questions, awaiting the answer with anxiety. And it was this: “Is the Way of the Law the only path possible for a saint? Can that way alone produce sainthood of the first order?”
And the Lord replied:
“Perfect saints from the first to the fourth degree are found only in the Noble Eightfold Path.”
And when he had given the reason why only under such discipline is perception perfected, Subaddha, hailing his words with gladness, every doubt lost in light, besought admission as a disciple and it was granted and the probation of four months remitted, though Subaddha himself willingly undertook that probation. But the Lord said:
“In this case I acknowledge the difference in persons.”
And this was the last man the Lord himself received. And because it could not be otherwise Subaddha attained light and percipience, and became conscious that for him birth was at an end, and he became a great Arhat. And he sat beside the Blessed One until the end.
And now the time drew on swiftly and knowing this, the Blessed One said, while they all stood in great grief surrounding him:
“It may be, Ananda, that in some of you the thought may arise—‘Now that the word of the Master is ended we have no Teacher.’ But this is not so. The truths and the rules of the Order—let them be your Teacher when I am gone. And when I am gone, Ananda, let the Order if it will, abolish the Lesser Precepts.”
And after awhile the Blessed One spoke again, and he said: