A History of Indian Literature v2.c19.s3.t1.12

v2.c19.s3.t1.12

there are many Suttas in Books II and III written in a mixture of prose and verse, a form so popular in India. The verses are either ballad verses (as in Nos. 16, 18, 19, 21) or momentous utterances (as in Nos. 16, 17). Elsewhere we find (as in Nos. 30, 31) a constant interchange between prose and gāthās, such as we shall frequently come across in the Sanskrit and half-Sanskrit Buddhist texts. Suttas Nos. 20 and 22 are almost entirely in verse.