法苑珠林 78.51

78.51

Yang Daosheng of Taishan under the Liang served as Military Aide-de-camp to the Prince of Shaoling of the Liang. His elder brother Haizhen served as Regional Inspector of Hanzhou. Daosheng requested leave to visit him. When he was about to return, his elder brother waited for Daosheng at a post along the nearby road. Daosheng saw a man tied to a tree; approaching to look, he found that it was an old retainer of his. Seeing Daosheng, he wept and pleaded piteously, saying, 'The Regional Inspector of Hanzhou intends to have me put to death; I beg you to save me.' Daosheng asked what crime he had committed, and he replied, 'Disappointed [in expectations], I fled and deserted.' Daosheng said, 'This is most hateful!' He immediately dismounted, gouged out his eyes with his waist-knife, and swallowed them. The retainer cried out to Heaven and wept upon the ground. Shortly thereafter, Haizhen arrived, and Daosheng further urged his elder brother to behead him decisively. After arriving at the banquet and sitting for a long while, [Daosheng] only then felt the eyes inside his throat, stuck and unwilling to go down. He called for wine to swallow them, repeatedly pouring down several cups, but in the end could not dislodge them. He felt his throat swelling and choking more and more, so the banquet was abandoned and they parted. After several days on the road, he died. Among those who witnessed it at the time, there was none who did not consider it proof of the Way of Heaven.