THE SOWER

  BHARADVAJA, a wealthy Brahman farmer, was celebrating his

harvest-thanksgiving when the Blessed One came with his alms-bowl,

begging for food. Some of the people paid him reverence, but the

Brahman was angry and said: "O samana, it would be more fitting for

thee to go to work than to beg. I plough and sow, and having

ploughed and sown, I eat. If thou didst likewise, thou, too, wouldst

have something to eat."

  The Tathagata answered him and said: "O Brahman, if too, plough

and sow, and having ploughed and sown, I eat." "Dost thou profess to

be a husbandman?" replied the Brahman. "Where, then, are thy bullocks?

Where is the seed and the plough?"

  The Blessed One said: "Faith is the seed I sow: good works are the

rain that fertilizes it; wisdom and modesty are the plough; my mind is

the guiding-rein; I lay hold of the handle of the law; earnestness

is the goad I use, and exertion is my draught-ox. This ploughing is

ploughed to destroy the weeds of illusion. The harvest it yields is

the immortal fruits of Nirvana, and thus all sorrow ends." Then the

Brahman poured rice-milk into a golden bowl and offered it to the

Blessed One, saying: "Let the Teacher of mankind partake of the

rice-milk, for the venerable Gotama ploughs a ploughing that bears the

fruit of immortality."