King Sivi

Once upon a time, when the mighty King Sivi reigned
in the city of Aritthapura in the kingdom of Sivi, the Great
Being was born as his son. They called his name Prince
Sivi. When he grew up, he went to Takkasila and studied
there ; then returning, he proved his knowledge to his
father the king, and by him was made viceroy. At his
father's death he became king himself, and, forsaking the
ways of evil, he kept the Ten Royal Virtues and ruled in
righteousness. He caused six alms-halls to be builded, at
the four gates, in the midst of the city, and at his own
door. He was munificent in distributing each day six
hundred thousand pieces of money. On the eighth, four-
teenth, and fifteenth days he never missed visiting the
alms-halls to see the distribution made.

Once on the day of the full moon, the state umbrella
had been uplifted early in the morning, and he sat on
the royal throne thinking over the gifts he had given.
Thought he to himself, "Of all outside things there is
nothing I have not given ; but this kind of giving does
not content me. I want to give something which is a
part of myself. Well, this day when I go to the alms-hall,
I vow that if any one ask not something outside me, but
name what is part of myself, if he should mention my
very heart, I will cut open my breast with a spear, and as
though I were drawing up a water-lily, stalk and all, from
a calm lake, I will pull forth my heart dripping with
blood-clots and give it him : if he should name the flesh
of my body, I will cut the flesh off my body and give it,
as though I were graving with a graving tool: let him
name my blood, I will give him my blood, dropping it in
his mouth or filling a bowl with it : or again, if one say, I
can't get my household work done, come and do me a
slave's part at home, then I will leave my royal dress and
stand without, proclaiming myself a slave, and slave's
work I will do : should any men demand my eyes, I will
tear out my eyes and give them, as one might take out
the pith of a palm-tree." Thus he thought within him :

If there be any human gift that I have never made,
Be it my eyes, I'll give it now, all firm and unafraid.

Then he bathed himself with sixteen pitchers of per-
fumed water, and adorned him in all hfs magnificence,
and after a meal of choice food he mounted upon an
elephant richly caparisoned and went to the alms-hall.

Sakka, perceiving his resolution, thought, "King Sivi
has determined to give his eyes to any chance comer who
may ask. Will he be able to do it, or no?" He deter-
mined to try him ; and, in the form of a brahmin old and
blind, he posted himself on a high place, and when the
king came to his alms-hall he stretched out his hand and
stood crying, " Long live the king ! " Then the king drove
his elephant towards him, and said, "What do you say,
brahmin ? " Sakka said to him, " O great king ! in all the
inhabited world there is no spot where the fame of your
munificent heart has not sounded. I am blind, and you
have two eyes." Then he repeated the first stanza, asking
for an eye:

To ask an eye the old man comes from far, for I have none:
give me one of yours, I pray, then we shall each have one.

When the Great Being heard this, thought he, " Why
that is just what I w r as thinking in my palace before I
came! What a fine chance! My heart's desire will be
fulfilled to-day; I shall give a gift which no man ever
gave yet." And he recited the second stanza:

Who taught thee hitherward to wend thy way,
O mendicant, and for an eye to pray?

The chiefest portion of a man is this,
And hard for men to part with, so they say.

(The succeeding stanzas are to be read two and two,
as may easily be seen.)

Sujampati among the gods, the same
Here among men called Maghava toy name,

He taught me hitherward to wend my way,
Begging, and for an eye to urge my claim.

'Tis the all-chiefest gift for which I pray.
Give me an eye! do not say me nay!

Give me an eye, that chiefest gift of gifts,
So hard for men to part with, as they say!

The wish that brought thee hitherward, the wish that did arise
Within thee, be that wish fulfilled. Here, brahmin, take my eyes.

One eye thou didst request of rue: behold, I give thee two!
Go with good sight, in all the people's view;
So be thy wish fulfilled and now come true.

So much the king said. But, thinking it not meet that
he should root out his eyes and bestow them there and
then, he brought the brahmin indoors with him, and sitting
on the royal throne, sent for a surgeon named Slvaka.
"Take out my eye," he then said.

Now all the city rang with the news, that the king
wished to tear out his eyes and give them to a brahmin.
Then the Commander-in-chief, and all the other officials,
and those beloved of the king, gathered together from
city and harem, and recited three stanzas, that they might
turn the king from his purpose :

do not give thine eye, my lord; desert us not, O king!
Give money, pearls and coral give, and many a precious thing:

Give thoroughbreds caparisoned, forth be the chariots rolled,
king, drive up the elephants all fine with cloth of gold:

These give, O king ! that we may all preserve thee safe and sound,
Thy faithful people, with our cars and chariots ranged around.

Hereupon the king recited three stanzas:

The soul which, having sworn to give, is then unfaithful found,
Puts his own neck within a snare low hidden on the ground.

The soul which, having sworn to give, is then unfaithful found,
More sinful is than sin, and he to Yama's house is bound.

That which is asked I give, and not the thing he asketh not,
This therefore which the brahmin asks, I give it on the spot.

Then the courtiers asked, "What do you desire in
giving your eyes?" repeating a stanza:

Life, beauty, joy or strength what is the prize,
king, which motive for your deed supplies ?
Why should the king of Sivi-land supreme
For the next world's sake thus bestow his eyes?

The king answered them in a stanza :

In giving thus, not glory is my goal,

Not sons, not w r ealth, or kingdoms to control:

This is the good old way of holy men ;
Of giving gifts enamoured is my soul.

To the Great Being's words the courtiers answered
nothing ; so the Great Being addressed Sivaka the surgeon
in a stanza:

A friend and comrade, Sivaka, art thou :
Do as I bid thee thou hast skill enow-
Take out my eyes, for this is my desire,
And in the beggar's hands bestow them now.

But Sivaka said, " Bethink you, my lord ! to give one's
eyes is no light thing." " Sivaka, I have considered ; don't
delay, nor talk too much in my presence." Then he
thought, "It is not fitting that a skilful surgeon like me
should pierce a king's eyes with the lancet," so he pounded
a number of simples, rubbed a blue lotus with the powder,
and brushed it over the right eye : round rolled the eye,
and there was great pain. " Reflect, my king, I can make
it all right." -" Go on, friend, no delay, please." Again
he rubbed in the powder, and brushed it over the eye:
the eye started from the socket, the pain was worse than
before. " Reflect, my king, I can still restore it." -" Be
quick with the job ! " A third time he smeared a sharper
powder, and applied it : by the drug's power round went
the eye, out it came from the socket, and hung dangling
at the end of the tendon. "Reflect, my king, I can yet
restore it again."- -" Be quick." The pain was extreme,
blood was trickling, the king's garments were stained with
the blood. The king's women and the courtiers fell at
his feet, crying, "My lord, do not sacrifice your eyes!"
loudly they wept and wailed. The king endured the pain,
and said, "My friend, be quick." "Very well, my lord,"
said the physician ; and with his left hand grasping the
eyeball took a knife in his right, and severing the tendon,
laid the eye in the Great Being's hand. He, gazing with
his left eye at the right and enduring the pain, said,
"Brahmin, come here." When the brahmin came near,
he went on " The eye of omniscience is dearer than this
eye a hundred fold, aye a thousand fold: there you have
my reason for this action," and he gave it to the brahmin,
who raised it and placed it in his own eye socket. There
it remained fixt by his power like a blue lotus in bloom.
When the Great Being with his left eye saw that eye in
his head, he cried "Ah, how good is this my gift of an
eye!" and thrilled straightway with the joy that had arisen
within him, he gave the other eye also. Sakka placed this
also in the place of his own eye, and departed from the
king's palace, and then from the city, with the gaze of the
multitude upon him, and went away to the world of gods.

In a short while the king's eyes began to grow; as
they grew, and before they reached the top of the holes,
a lump of flesh rose up inside like a ball of wool, filling
the cavity; they were like a doll's eyes, but the pain
ceased. The Great Being remained in the palace a few
days. Then he thought, "What has a blind man to do
with ruling ? I will hand over my kingdom to the courtiers,
and go into my park, and become an ascetic, and live as
a holy man." He summoned his courtiers, and told them
what he intended to do. " One man," said he, " shall be
with me, to wash my face, and so forth, and to do all that
is proper, and you must fasten a cord to guide me to the
retiring places." Then calling for his charioteer, he bade
him prepare the chariot. But the courtiers would not
allow him to go in the chariot ; they brought him out in
a golden litter, and set him down by the lake side, and
then, guarding him all around, returned. The king sat in
the litter thinking of his gift.

At that moment Sakka's throne became hot; and he
pondering perceived the reason. " I will offer the king a
boon," thought he, " and make his eye well again." So to
that place he came ; and not far off from the Great Being,
he walked up and down, up and down.

" Who is that ? " cried the Great Being, when he heard
the sound of the footsteps. Sakka repeated a stanza :

Sakka, the king of gods, am I; to visit thee I came:

Choose thou a boon, royal sage ! whate'er thy wish may name.

The king replied with another stanza :

Wealth, strength, and treasure without end, these I have left
behind :
Sakka, death and nothing more I want: for I am blind.

Then Sakka said, "Do you ask death, King Sivi, be-
cause you wish to die, or because you are blind?"
" Because I am blind, my lord." -" The gift is not every-
thing in itself, your majesty, it was made with a view to
the future. Yet there is a motive relating to this visible
world. Now you were asked for one eye, and gave two ;
make an Act of Truth about it." Then he began a stanza :

O warrior, lord of biped kind, declare the thing that's true:
If you the truth declare, your eye shall be restored to you.

On hearing this, the Great Being replied, " If you wish
to give me an eye, Sakka, do not try any other means,
but let my eye be restored as a consequence of my gift."
Sakka said, "Though they call me Sakka, king of the
gods, your majesty, yet I cannot give an eye to anyone
else ; but by the fruit of the gift by thee given, and by
nothing else, your eye shall be restored to you." Then
the other repeated a stanza, maintaining that his gift was
well given:

Whatever sort, whatever kind of suitor shall draw near,

Whoever comes to ask of me, he to my heart is dear:

If these my solemn words be true, now let my eye appear!

Even as he uttered the words, one of his eyes grew up
in the socket. Then he repeated a couple of stanzas to
restore the other :

A brahmin came to visit me, one of my eyes to crave:
Unto that brahmin mendicant the pair of them I gave.

A greater joy and more delight that action did afford.

If these my solemn words be true, be the other eye restored!

On the instant appeared his second eye. But these
eyes of his were neither natural nor divine. An eye
given by Sakka as the brahmin, cannot be natural, we
know ; on the other hand, a divine eye cannot be pro-
duced in anything that is injured. But these eyes are
called the eyes of the Attainment of Truth. At the
time when they came into existence, the whole royal
retinue by Sakka's power was assembled ; and Sakka
standing in the midst of the throng, uttered praise in a
couple of stanzas :

fostering King of Sivi laud, these holy hymns of thine
Have gained for thee as bounty free this pair of eyes divine.
Through rock and wall, o'er hill and dale, whatever bar may be,
A hundred leagues on every side those eyes of thine shall see.

Having uttered these stanzas, poised in the air before
the multitude, with a last counsel to the Great Being that
he should be vigilant, Sakka returned to the world of
gods. And the Great Being, surrounded by his retinue,
went back in great pomp to the city, and entered the
palace called Candaka, the Peacock's Eye. The news
that he had got his eyes again spread abroad all through
the Kingdom of Sivi. All the people gathered together
to see him, with gifts in their hands. " Now all this multi-
tude is come together," thought the Great Being, " I shall
praise my gift that I gave." He caused a great pavilion
to be put up at the palace gate, where he seated himself
upon the royal throne, with the white umbrella spread
above him. Then the drum was sent beating about the
city, to collect all the trade guilds. Then he said, "O
people of Sivi ! now you have beheld these divine eyes,
never eat food without giving something away!" and he
repeated four stanzas, declaring the Law :

Who, if he's asked to give, would answer no,
Although it be his best and choicest prize?

People of Sivi thronged in concourse, ho!
Come hither, see the gift of God, my eyes!

Through rock and wall, o'er hill and dale, whatever bar may be,
A hundred leagues on every side these eyes of mine can see.

Self-sacrifice in all men mortal living,

Of all things is most fine:
I sacrificed a mortal eye; and giving,

Received an eye divine.

See, people! see, give ere ye eat, let others have a share.
This done with your best will and care,
Blameless to heaven you shall repair.

In these four verses he declared the Law; and after
that, every fortnight, on the holy day, even every fifteenth
day, he declared the Law in these same verses without
cessation to a great gathering of people. Hearing which,
the people after giving alms and doing good deeds,
attained to heaven.