[121] An asankheyya is a period of vast duration, lit. an incalculable.
[122] Lit. “caused the drums to be beat.”
[123] Here a gloss in the text enumerates the whole ten cries.
[124] The Bodhisatta is frequently called paṇḍita, e.g. sasapaṇḍito (Five Jāt. 52), Rāmapaṇḍito (Dasaratha Jāt. 1).
[125] Lit. “Extinction.”
[126] Mr. Fausböll points out to me that in tividhaggi and jāti we have Vedic abbreviations.
[127] Evaṁ samāhite citte parisuddhe pariyodāte anaṅgaṇe vigatūpakkilese mudubhūte kammaniye ṭhite ānejjappatte ñāṇadassanāya cittaṁ abhinīharati (Sāmañña-phala Sutta, see Lotus, p. 476, line 14).
[128] Mr. Fausböll writes to me that guṇe for guṇehi must be viewed as an old Pali form originating in the Sanskrit guṇaih.
[129] Here follow four pages of later commentary or gloss, which I leave untranslated.
[130] The following is what I take to be the meaning of this passage: “If I chose I could at once enter the Buddhist priesthood, and by the practice of ecstatic meditation (Jhāna) free myself from human passion, and become an Arhat or saint. I should then at death at once attain Nirvāna and cease to exist. But this would be a selfish course to pursue, for thus I should benefit myself only. Why should I thus slip unobserved and in the humble garb of a monk into Nirvāna? Nay, let me rather qualify myself to become a Buddha, and so save others as well as myself.” This is the great Act of Renunciation by which the Bodhisattva, when Nirvāna was within his grasp, preferred to endure ages of heroic trials in the exercise of the Pāramitās, that he might be enabled to become a Buddha, and so redeem mankind. See D’Alwis’s Introduction to Kachchāyana’s Grammar, p. vi.