A History of Indian Literature v2.c20.s2.32

v2.c20.s2.32

The first Aṅga is the Āyāraṁga-Sutta.⁴ In two lengthy sections (śruta-skandha) it treats of the way of life (āyāra, Sansk. ācāra) of a monk. The first section, which makes a very archaic impression, is most decidedly earlier than the second, and yet even the first is a mosaic pieced together from heterogeneous elements. Here again we meet with the mixture of prose and verse which we so frequently encountered in Buddhist literature. Now we have long series of stanzas, now long prose passages without verse, then again a rapid change between prose and verse, and often it is only fragments of verses, some long, some short, which are inserted into the prose passages.[^1)