266

Of all paths the Eightfold Path is the best; of all truths the Four Noble Truths are the best; of all things passionlessness is the best; of people the Seeing One (the Buddha) is the best.

267

This is the only way: there is none other for the purification of insight. Tread this path, and you will bewilder Mara.

268

Walking upon this path you will make an end of suffering. Having discovered how to pull out the thorn of lust, I expound the path.

269

You yourselves must strive; the Buddhas only point the way. Those meditative ones who tread the path are released from the bonds of Mara.

270

"All conditioned things are impermanent" --when one sees this with wisdom one turns away from suffering. This is the path to purification.

271

"All conditioned things are unsatisfactory" --when one sees this with wisdom one turns away from suffering. This is the path to purification.

272

"All things are not self"--when one sees this with wisdom one turns away from suffering.

273

This is the path to purification.

274

The idler who does not exert oneself when one should, who though young and strong is full of sloth, with a mind full of vain thoughts such an indolent person does not find the path to wisdom.

275

Watchful of speech, well controlled in mind, let a person not commit evil with the body.

276

Let one purify these three courses of action, and win the path made known by the Great Sage.

277

Wisdom springs from meditation, without meditation wisdom wanes. Having known these two paths of progress and decline, let a person so conduct oneself that one's wisdom may increase.

278

Cut down the forest (of lust), but not the tree. From the forest (of lust) springs fear.

279

Having cut down the forest and the underbrush (of desire), be passionless, O renunciates! For so long as the underbrush of desire, even the most subtle, of a person towards another is not cut down, one's mind is in bondage, like the sucking calf to its mother.

280

Cut off your affection in the manner a person plucks with one's hand an autumn lotus.

281

Cultivate only the path to peace, to Nibbana, as made known by the Exalted One.

282

"Here shall I live during the rains, here in winter and summer"--thus thinks the fool.

283

One does not realize the danger (that death might intervene).

284

As a great flood carries away a sleeping village, just so death seizes and carries away a person with a clinging mind, doting on one's children and cattle.

285

For one who is assailed by death there is no protection by kinsmen. None there are to save one--no sons, nor father nor relatives.

286

Realizing this fact, let the wise person, restrained by morality, hasten to clear the path leading to Nibbana.