LITMIR.BIZ

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      And while his soft touch comforted the wretch,

      Asked: "Brother, what is ill with thee? what harm

      Hath fallen? wherefore canst thou not arise?

      Why is it, Channa, that he pants and moans,

      And gasps to speak and sighs so pitiful?"

      Then spake the charioteer: "Great Prince! this man

      Is smitten with some pest; his elements

      Are all confounded; in his veins the blood,

      Which ran a wholesome river, leaps and boils

      A fiery flood; his heart, which kept good time,

      Beats like an ill-played drum-skin, quick and slow;

      His sinews slacken like a bow-string slipped;

      The strength is gone from ham, and loin, and neck,

      And all the grace and joy of manhood fled;

      This is a sick man with the fit upon him.

      See how be plucks and plucks to seize his grief,

      And rolls his bloodshot orbs and grinds his teeth,

      And draws his breath as if 'twere choking smoke.

      Lo! now he would be dead, but shall not die

      Until the plague hath had its work in him,

      Killing the nerves which die before the life;

      Then, when his strings have cracked with agony

      And all his bones are empty of the sense

      To ache, the plague will quit and light elsewhere.

      Oh, sir! it is not good to hold him so!

      The harm may pass, and strike thee, even thee."

      But spake the Prince, still comforting the man,

      "And are there others, are there many thus?

      Or might it be to me as now with him?"

      "Great Lord!" answered the charioteer, "this comes

      In many forms to all men; griefs and wounds,

      Sickness and tetters, palsies, leprosies,

      Hot fevers, watery wastings, issues, blains

      Befall all flesh and enter everywhere."

      "Come such ills unobserved?" the Prince inquired.

      And Channa said: "Like the sly snake they come

      That stings unseen; like the striped murderer,

      Who waits to spring from the Karunda bush,

      Hiding beside the jungle path; or like

      The lightning, striking these and sparing those,

      As chance may send."

      "Then all men live in fear?"

      "So live they, Prince!"

      "And none can say, `I sleep

      Happy and whole tonight, and so shall wake'?"

      "None say it."

      "And the end of many aches,

      Which come unseen, and will come when they come,

      Is this, a broken body and sad mind,

      And so old age?"

      "Yea, if men last as long."

      "But if they cannot bear their agonies,

      Or if they will not bear, and seek a term;

      Or if they bear, and be, as this man is,

      Too weak except for groans, and so still live,

      And growing old, grow older, then what end?"

      "They die, Prince."

      "Die?"

      "Yea, at the last comes death,

      In whatsoever way, whatever hour.

      Some few grow old, most suffer and fall sick,

      But all must die—behold, where comes the Dead!"

      Then did Siddartha raise his eyes, and see

      Fast pacing towards the river brink a band

      Of wailing people, foremost one who swung

      An earthen bowl with lighted coals, behind

      The kinsmen shorn, with mourning marks, ungirt,

      Crying aloud, "O Rama, Rama, hear!

      Call upon Rama, brothers"; next the bier,

      Knit of four poles with bamboos interlaced,

      Whereon lay, stark and stiff, feet foremost, lean,

      Chapfallen, sightless, hollow-flanked, a-grin,

      Sprinkled with red and yellow dust—the Dead,

      Whom at the four-went ways they turned head first,

      And crying "Rama, Rama!" carried on

      To where a pile was reared beside the stream;

      Thereon they laid him, building fuel up—

      Good sleep hath one that slumbers on that bed!

      He shall not wake for cold albeit he lies

      Naked to all the airs—for soon they set

      The red flame to the corners four, which crept,

      And licked, and flickered, finding out his flesh

      And feeding on it with swift hissing tongues,

      And crackle of parched skin, and snap of joint;

      Till the fat smoke thinned and the ashes sank

      Scarlet and grey, with here and there a bone

      White midst the grey—the total of the man.

      Then spake the Prince, "Is this the end which comes

      To all who live?"

      "This is the end that comes

      To all," quoth Channa; "he upon the pyre—

      Whose remnants are so petty that the crows

      Caw hungrily, then quit the fruitless feast—

      Ate, drank, laughed, loved, and lived, and liked life well.

      Then came—who knows?—some gust of junglewind,

      A stumble on the path, a taint in the tank,

      A snake's nip, half a span of angry steel,

      A chill, a fishbone, or a falling tile,

      And life was over and the man is dead.

      No appetites, no pleasures, and no pains

      Hath such; the kiss upon his lips is nought,

      The fire-scorch nought; he smelleth not his flesh

      A-roast, nor yet the sandal and the spice

      They burn; the taste is emptied from his mouth,

      The hearing of his ears is clogged, the sight

      Is blinded in his eyes; those whom he loved

      Wail desolate, for even that must go,

      The body, which was lamp unto the life,

      Or worms will have a horrid feast of it.

      Here is the common destiny of flesh.

      The high and low,

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