Page:Buddhist Birth Stories, or, Jātaka Tales.djvu/367

 No. 25.

TITTHA JĀTAKA.

The Horse at the Ford.

"Feed the horse, then, charioteer," etc. — This the Master told while at Jetavana about a monk who at that time was a co-resident junior under the Minister of Righteousness, but who had formerly been a goldsmith.

For the knowledge of hearts and motives belongs to the Buddhas only, and to no one else ; and hence it was that even the Minister of Righteousness prescribed corruption as a subject of meditation for the monk under his rule, through ignorance of his true character.

Now the monk derived no benefit from that religious exercise — for the following reason. He had come to life in five hundred successive births in a goldsmith's house. From the continual sight through so long a period of the purest gold, the idea of impurity was difficult for him to grasp. Four months he spent without being able to get the faintest notion of it.

As the Minister of Righteousness was unable to bestow salvation (Arahatship) on his co-resident junior, he said to himself, "He must be one of those whom only a Buddha can lead to the Truth! We will take him to the Tathāgata." And he led him to the Master.

The Master inquired of Sāriputta why he brought the