Page:Sacred Books of the East - Volume 21.djvu/451

 verted by a Pratyekabuddha ; under the shape of a Tathdgata to such as must be converted by a Tath£- gata. Nay, he will show to those who must be con- verted by a relic of the Tathigata himself such a relic, and to those who must be converted by com- plete extinction he will show himself completely extinct. Such is the powerful knowledge, Padma^rf, the Bodhisattva Mahdsattva is possessed of.

Thereafter the Bodhisattva MahAsattva Padma^rt said to the Lord : The Bodhisattva Mah&sattva Gadgadasvara then has planted good roots, Lord. What meditation is it, Lord, whereby the Bodhisattva Mah&sattva Gadgadasvara, with unshaken firmness, has converted (or educated) so many creatures ? Whereupon the Lord ^kyamuni, the Tathigata, &c, replied to the Bodhisattva Mahdsattva Padmairt : It is, young man of good family, the meditation termed Sarvartipasandarcana. By steadiness in it has the Bodhisattva Mahisattva Gadgadasvara so immensely promoted the weal of creatures.

While this chapter of Gadgadasvara was being expounded 2, all the eighty-four hundred thousand myriads of ko/is of Bodhisattvas Mah&sattvas who, along with the Bodhisattva Mahdsattva Gadgada- svara, had come to the Saha-world, obtained the

It need not be observed that the chapter was not expounded, the Buddha being one of the dramatis personæ, one of the interlocutors, but not the narrator. This confusion between epical and dramatical exposition is one of the most striking features of the Lotus. The Saddharma, the law of nature, may be said to have been expounded by the TathSgata, not, however, the composition which bears that title. D d 2