Page:Buddhist Birth Stories, or, Jātaka Tales.djvu/149

Rh they do, for they might at will fill with their lustre ten thousand worlds or more. But in accordance with a prayer made by him in a former existence, the lustre of Mangala Buddha permanently filled ten thousand worlds, just as the lustre of the others permanently extended to the distance of a fathom. The story is that when he was performing the duties of a Bodhisatta, being in an existence corresponding to the Vessantara existence, he dwelt with his wife and children on a mountain like the Vanka mountain (of the Vessantara Jātaka). One day a demon named Kharadāthika, hearing of the Bodhisatta's inclination to giving, approached him in the guise of a brahmin, and asked the Bodhisatta for his two children. The Bodhisatta, exclaiming, "I give my children to the brahmin," cheerfully and joyfully gave up both the children, thereby causing the ocean-girt earth to quake. The demon, standing by the bench at the end of the cloistered walk, while the Bodhisatta looked on, devoured the children like a bunch of roots. Not a particle of sorrow arose in the Bodhisatta as he looked on the demon, and saw his mouth as soon as he opened it disgorging streams of blood like flames of fire, nay, a great joy and satisfaction welled within him as he thought, "My gift was well given." And he put up the prayer, "By the merit of this deed may rays of light one day issue from me in this very way." In consequence of this prayer of his it was that the rays emitted from his body when he became Buddha filled so vast a space. There was also another deed done by him in a former existence. It is related that, when a Bodhisatta, having visited the relic shrine of a Buddha, he exclaimed, "I