Page:Buddhist Birth Stories, or, Jātaka Tales.djvu/131

Rh The hermit Sumedha, exclaiming, "My prayer, it seems, will be accomplished," was filled with happiness. The multitudes, hearing the words of Dīpankara Buddha, were joyous and delighted, exclaiming, "The hermit Sumedha, it seems, is an embryo Buddha, the tender shoot that will grow up into a Buddha." For thus they thought, "As a man fording a river, if he is unable to cross to the ford opposite him, crosses to a ford lower down the stream, even so we, if under the dispensation of Dīpankara Buddha we fail to attain the Paths and their fruition, yet when thou shalt become Buddha we shall be enabled in thy presence to make the paths and their fruition our own," — and so they recorded their prayer (for future sanctification). And Dīpankara Buddha also having praised the Bodhisatta, and made an offering to him of eight handfuls of flowers, reverentially saluted him and departed. And the Arhats also, four hundred thousand in number, having made offerings to the Bodhisatta of perfumes and garlands, reverentially saluted him and departed. And the angels and men having made the same offerings, and bowed down to him, went their way.

And the Bodhisatta, when all had retired, rising from his seat and exclaiming, "I will investigate the Perfections," sat himself down cross-legged on a heap of flowers. And as the Bodhisatta sat thus, the angels in all the ten thousand worlds assembling shouted applause. "Venerable hermit Sumedha," they said, "all the auguries which have manifested themselves when former Bodhisattas seated themselves cross-legged, saying, 'We will investigate the Perfections,'—all these this day have appeared: assuredly thou shalt become Buddha. This we know, to whom these omens appear, he surely will become Buddha; do thou make a strenuous effort and exert thyself." With these words they lauded the Bodhisatta with varied praises. Therefore it is said,