The Sword of Song

SCIENCE AND BUDDHISM 115 And s o for all the Eight S tages; as regards their obvious meaning on the moral plane, I can do no better than quote my friend Bhikku Ananda Maitriya, in his “Four Noble Truths.” “He who has attained, by force of pure understanding, to the realisation of the Four Noble Truths, who has realised the fact that depends from that understanding, namely that all the constituents of bein are by nature endowed with the Three Character-istics of Sorrow, Transitoriness, and Absence of any immortal principle or Atma—such a one is said to be Sam maditthi, to hold right views, and the term has com e to m ean one of the Buddhist Faith. We may not have taken the other and higher steps on the Noble Eightfold Path; but must have rea- lised those Four Truths and their sequential three Characteristics. He who has attained Sammaditthi has at least entered upon the Holy W ay, and, if he but try, there will come to him the power to overcome the other fetters that restri ct his progress. But first of all he must abandon all those false hopes and beliefs; and one who has done this is called a Buddhist. And this holding of Right Views, in Pali Sam maditthi, is the first step upon the Noble Eightfold Path. “The second stage is Right Aspiration— Sammasankappo. Having realised the woe and transitoriness and soullessness of all life, there rises in the m ind this Right Aspi- ration. W hen all things suffer, we at least will not increase their burden, so we aspire to become pitiful and loving, to cherish ill- will toward none, to retire from those pleasures of sense which are the fruitful cause of woe. The will, we all know, is ever readier than the mind, and so, though w e aspire to renounce the pleasures of s ense, to love and pity all that lives, yet perhaps we often fail in the accom plishment of our aspiration. But if the desire to becom e pitiful and pure be but honest and earnest, we have gained the Second Step upon the Path—Sammasankappo, Right Aspiration. “He whose motives are pure has no need to conceal the Truth—he who truly loves and who has a m alice towards none, will ever speak only fair and s oft words. By a man’s speech do we learn his nature, and that one whose Right Aspirations are b earing fruit attains to the Third Step, Right Speech, Sammaváca. S peaking only the Truth in all things, never speaking harshly or un- kindly, in his speech realising the love and pity that is in his heart—that man has attained to Stage the Third. “And becaus e of the great power of a man’s thoughts and words to change his being, because by thinking of the pitiful our acts grow full of m ercy, therefore is Stage the Fourth called Right Conduct. To him who has gained this Fourth Stage, his intense as-piration, his right understanding, his care-fully guarded speech—perhaps for many years of self-control—have at last borne outward fruit, till all his acts are loving, and pure, and done without hope of gain, he has attained the Fourth Step, called Sammakammanto. “And when, growing y et holier, that habit of Right Action grows fi rm and inalienable, when his whole life is lived for the Faith that is in him , when every act of his daily life, yea, of his sleep also, is set to a holy purpose, when not one thought or deed that is cruel or unpitiful can stain his being— when, not even as a duty, will he inflict pain by deed, word, or thought—then he has gained the Fifth High Path, the Living of the Life that’s Right—Sammá ajivo. Abstaining from all that can caus e pain, he has become blameless, and can live only by such occupations as can bring no sorrow in their train.1 “To him who has lived so, say the Holy Books, there comes a power which is unknown to ordinary men. Long training and restraint have given him conquest of his mind, he can 1 From m y point of view, this is of cour se impossible. See Sec. III. If wilf ul in fliction o f pain only is m eant, our state becom es m oral, or even worse!—mystical. I should pr efer to cancel this sentence. Cf. Appendix I, supra.—A. C.