Pre-Buddhist India: A Political, Administrative, Economic, Social and Geographical Survey of Ancient India Based Mainly on the Jataka Stories c4.t1.44

c4.t1.44

Says a *gāthā* of one *Jātaka*: "Right should never be violated.... If Right is destroyed, it destroys."³ This *Dhamma* then was very comprehensive, embracing the whole bundle of laws that formed the basis of social, economic and political order. To abide by these laws was the supreme duty of a king. These are no abstract principles of righteousness as the citations quoted above will show. The significant, practical and positive character of these will also be seen from the oftrepeated passages in the *Jātakas*⁴ which mean by *Dhamma* the fulfilment and maintenance of the rights belonging to relations, subjects, communities and officials and servants: "*Dhammam cara mahārāja mātāpitusu . . . puttadāresu . . . mittāmccesu . . . raṭṭhe Janapade . . . samaṇabrāhmaṇe . . . migapakkhisu.*"