Page:The Sanskrit Drama.djvu/87

82 In this point there is a deliberate and certainly artistic deviation from the ordinary version of the incident, followed in the Buddhacarita, in which the prophecy of the Buddha is addressed, not to the disciples themselves, but to others of the Buddha's followers. The end of the play is marked by a philosophic dialogue between Çāriputra and the Buddha, which includes a polemic against the belief in the existence of a permanent self; it terminates in a praise of his two new disciples by the Buddha, and a formal benediction.

The most remarkable thing regarding this drama is its close correspondence to the classical type as laid down in the Nāṭyaçāstra. The piece is a Prakaraṇa, and it has nine acts, which accords perfectly with the rule of the Çāstra; the Mṛcchakaṭikā and Mālatīmādhava have ten apiece; the Acts bear no titles, but this is in accord with the normal usage, though the Mṛcchakaṭikā gives names. The hero is Çāriputra, who corresponds to the Brahmin hero of the Çāstra, and who is emphatically of the noble and calm type enjoined by that authority. Whether the heroine was a lady or a hetaera we do not know, nor does it appear how far the poet altered the subject-matter by invention, which is normally the case with later Prakaraṇas. The Buddha and his disciples, including, beside the two heroes, Kauṇḍinya and a Çramaṇa speak Sanskrit, and use both prose and verse; the Vidūṣaka speaks Prākrit. The presence of this figure is a remarkable proof of the fixed character attained by the drama, for in itself there is nothing more absurd than that a youthful ascetic seeking after truth should be encumbered by one who is a meet attendant on a wealthy merchant, Brahmin, or minister. It can, therefore, only be supposed that Açvaghoṣa was writing a type of drama in which the rôle was far too firmly embedded to permit its omission, and presumably in the story of the drama now lost to us the Vidūṣaka served to introduce comic relief. With natural good taste, he disappears from the last Act, where Çāriputra has no need as a member of the Buddha's fraternity for encumbrances like a jester.

In one point only has it been claimed to find a clear discrepancy between Açvaghoṣa's practice and that of the later drama. At the close the theory requires that the question, 'Is