Page:Asoka - the Buddhist Emperor of India.djvu/182

180 The text and translation may now he accepted as settled, subject to doubts as to the exact meaning of abkajaṁyo. The purport of the document is sufficiently plain.

EDICT X TRUE GLORY (G. text; the other texts do not vary materially.)

'His Sacred and Gracious Majesty the King does not believe that glory or renown brings much profit unless in both the present and the future my people ohediently hearken to the Law of Piety and conform to its precepts. For that purpose only does His Sacred and Gracious Majesty the King desire glory or renown.

Whatsoever exertions His Sacred and Gracious Majesty the King makes, all are for the sake of the life hereafter, so that every one may be freed from peril, and that peril is vice.

Difficult, verily, it is to attain such freedom, whether by people of low or of high degree, save by the utmost exertion, giving up all other aims. That, however, for him of high degree is difficult.'

Comment

This and the next document are the easiest of the R. E. The translation of Edict X in the second edition stands unaltered.

'My people,' me jans. In the other texts me refers to the royal teaching. 'Freed from peril,' apa—parisrare, more literally 'with as little (alpa) peril as possible.' Some of the ideas are repeated in R. E. XIII.

Milton offers a strikingly close parallel:—

They err who count it glorious to subdue

By conquest far and wide, to overrun

Large countries, and in field great battles win,

Great cities by assault. . ..