Psalms of the Brethren CCLXI: Kassapa the Great

Walk not where many folk would make thee chief.
Dizzy the mind becomes, and hard to win
Is concentrated thought. And he who knows:
‘Ill bodes the company of many folk,’
Will keep himself aloof from haunt of crowds.

Go not, O sage, to hearths of citizens.
Who greedy seeks to taste life’s feast entire,
Neglects the good that brings true happiness.

A treacherous bog it is, this patronage
Of bows and gifts and treats from wealthy folk.
’Tis like a fine dart, bedded in the flesh,
For erring human hard to extricate.

Down from my mountain-lodge I came one day
And made my round for alms about the streets.
A leper there I saw eating his meal,
[And as was meet, that he might have a chance,]
In [silent] courtesy I halted at his side.

He with his hand all leprous and diseased
Put in my bowl a morsel; as he threw,
A finger, mortifying, broke and fell.

Leaning against a wall I ate my share,
Nor at the time nor after felt disgust.

For only he who taketh as they come
The scraps of food, medicine from excrement,
The couch beneath the tree, the patchwork robe,
Stands as a man in north, south, east, or west.

By forces of the spirit fortified,
Doth Kassapa ascend the mountain bro.w.

Returning from the daily round for alms,
Kassapa mounts some craggy coign and sits
In meditation rapt, nor clutching aught,
For far from him hath he put fear and dread.

So mounting to some craggy coign he sits,
In meditation rapt, nor clutches aught,
For he mong those that burn is cool and still.

So mounting to some craggy coign he sits,
In meditation rapt, nor clutches aught;
His task is done, and he is sane, immune.

Those upland glades delightful to the soul,
Where the kareri spreads its wildering wreaths,
Where sound the trumpet-calls of elephants:
Those are the braes wherein my soul delights.

Those rocky heights with hue of dark blue clouds,
Where lies embosomed many a shining tarn
Of crystal-clear, cool waters, and whose slopes
The ‘herds of Indra’ cover and bedeck:
Those are the braes wherein my soul delights.

Like serried battlements of blue-black cloud,
Like pinnacles on stately castle built,
Re-echoing to the cries of jungle folk:
Those are the braes wherein my soul delights.

Fair uplands rain-refreshed, and resonant
With crested creatures’ cries antiphonal,
Lone heights where silent Rishis oft resort:
Those are the braes wherein my soul delights.

Here is enough for me who fain would dwell
In meditation rapt, mindful and tense.
Here is enough for me, who fain would seek
The highest good, a brother filled with zeal.

Here is enough for me, who fain would dwell
In happy ease, a brother filled with zeal.
Here is enough for me who give myself
To studious toil, so am I filled with zeal.

Clad with the azure bloom of flax, blue-flecked
As sky in autumn; quick with crowds
Of all their varied winged populace:
Such are the braes wherein my soul delights.

Free from the crowds of citizens below,
But thronged with flocks of many winged things,
The home of herding creatures of the wild:
Such are the braes wherein my soul delights.

Crags where clear waters lie, a rocky world,
Haunted by black-faced apes and timid deer,
Where ’neath bright blossoms run the silver streams:
Such are the braes wherein my soul delights.

‘Lone heights where silent Rishis oft resort.’
‘The lightnings flash e’en in the rocky cave,
Smiting Vebhdra’s crest and Pandava,
And in the mountain-bosom hid, a child
Of the incomparable Master sits,
Ardent in contemplative ecstasy.’
For that which brings me exquisite delight
Is not the strains of string and pipe and drum,
But when, with intellect well poised, intent,
I gain the perfect vision of the Norm.

Let not a brother occupy himself
With busy works; let him keep clear of folk,
Nor strive [to copy nor to emulate].
Who greedy seeks to taste life’s feast entire,
Neglects the good that brings true happiness.

Let not a brother occupy himself
With busy works; let him keep clear of this
That nowise tendeth to his real good;
The body toils and suffers weariness,
Ail’d* thus afflicted he attains no calm.

By mere repeating with a muttering lip,
We see not e’en ourselves for what we are;
And so, stiff-necked, we go about and deem:
‘A better man am I than he, than they!’

No better, truly is the fool, and yet
He deems himself to be; the better man.
• But him, poor creature of a; stiff-necked mind,
Command not They who truly understand,

Who is not exercised about himself,
In this way or in that: — ‘the better man
Or yet again ‘I am as good as he’ —

He who doth really know, and speaketh truth,
Whose heart in righteousness is well composed,
And holdeth fast the saint’s serenity,
Him do they praise, who truly understand.

He who among his fellow-brethren wins
No reverence, is far from the good Norm
As is the firmament far from the earth.

But they who well have planted modesty
And eke discretion alway in their heart,
They in the holy life do richly thrive;
For them rebirths are ever at an end.

A brother who, though clad in patchwork robe,
Is of a puffed-up and unsteady mind,
As ’twere a monkey in a lion’s hide,
No glory from his gear august doth gain.

But who, with uninflated, steadfast mind,
Is prudent, with his senses well controlled,
He shineth glorious in a patchwork robe,
As lion in the sombre mountain cave.

See how they stand, those thronging deities
Of mystic potency and glorious,
Ten times a thousand, all of Brahma’s heaven,

Around our valiant Captain of the Norm,
Great son of Sari, calm and rapt in thought,
Acclaiming him with clasped hands upraised: —

‘Hail thou, humanity’s aristocrat!
Glory to thee, O thou supremest man!
Lo! past our thinking are thy ranging thoughts;

O wondrous are th’ Enlightened of the world I
Their intuition, how profoundly deep,
Beyond the powers to which we testify,
Though we be skilled as archer splitting hairs!’

Then, seeing Sariputta thus adored
By hosts divine, saint most adorable,
A smile stole o’er the face of Kappina.

In the whole field of Buddha’s following,
Saving alone the mighty Master’s self,
I stand the foremost in ascetic ways;
No man doth practise them so far as I.

The Master hath my fealty and love,
And all the Buddha’s ordinance is done.
Low have I laid the heavy load I bore,
Cause for rebirth is found in me no more.

No more than spotless lotus-blossom takes
A mark from water; to self-sacrifice
Continually prone, he from the sphere
Threefold of new becoming is detached.

The neck of him is like the fourfold tower,
Of mindfulness set up; yea, the great Seer
Hath faith and confidence for hands; above,
The brow of him is insight; nobly wise, j
He ever walketh in cool blessedness.