Coomaraswamy, Ananda Kentish: Buddha and the gospel of buddhism (London, 1916)

The Search for the Way of Escape
him as to a friend, and said: “ Grieve not, O Kanthaka,
for thy perfect equine nature has been proved—bear with
it, and soon thy pain shall bear its fruit.” But Kanthaka,
thinking: “From this day forth I shall never see my
master more,” went out of their sight, and there died of a
broken heart and was reborn in the Heaven of the Thirty-
three. Then Channa’s grief was doubled; and torn by
the second sorrow of the death of Kanthaka, he returned
to the city weeping and wailing, and the Bodhisatta was
left alone.
The Search for The Way of Escape
The Bodhisatta remained for a week in the Mango-grove
of Anupiya, and thereafter he proceeded to Rajagaha, the
chief town of Magadha. He begged his food from door
to door, and the beauty of his person cast the whole city
into commotion. When this was made known to the
king Bimbisara, he went to the place where the Bodhi-
satta was sitting, and offered to bestow upon him the
whole kingdom: but again the Bodhisatta refused the
royal throne, for he had already abandoned all in the hope
of attaining enlightenment, and did not desire a worldly
empire. But he granted the king’s request that when he
had found the way, he would preach it first in that same
kingdom.
It is said that when the Bodhisatta entered a hermitage
for the first time (and this was before he proceeded to
Rajagaha) he found the sages practising many and strange
penances, and he inquired their meaning, and what was the
purpose that each endeavoured to achieve and received
the answer—“ By such penances endured for a time,
by the higher they attain heaven, and by the lower,
favourable fruit in the world of men: by pain they come
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