A History of Sanskrit Literature c10.s2.1.3

c10.s2.1.3

the picture of the pleasures of love drawn by Açvaghoṣa is already marked by that wealth of intimate detail which appeals to all Indian poets, but proves a grave stumbling block to critics who find matter for offence even in the charming picture of the deceiving Zeus in the *Iliad* and reprobate in the author of the *Odyssey* the episode of the amour of Ares and Aphrodite. But still more sincere is the burning enthusiasm of the poet for his own ideal, not the Arhat, contented to seek his own freedom from rebirth in this world of misery, but the Bodhisattva, the Buddha to be, who delays, however, his entering into Nirvāṇa until he has accomplished his view of freeing all other creatures from the delusion which makes them cling throughout the ages to mortal life and its woes. This is a new note in Sanskrit poetry; Vālmīki has majesty and a calm seriousness, but he is free from passion like his hero, who though he experiences vicissitudes yet stands apart from them, and of whose ultimate success we never doubt. Nanda's rejection of Sundarī may seem to us heartless enough; his transference of his fickle affection to the Apsarases has its comic side, but in the end he seeks the welfare of others, even as does the Buddha; Rāma on the contrary in his rejection of Sītā after the long agony of separation from him has no warmer motive than obedience to the doctrine that Caesar's wife must be above suspicion.