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Samyutt., 2.179. 2. Ibid., 22.99. 3. Angutt., 10.117; Dhammapada, 85. 4. Dīgha, 16.5.5. 5. Dhammapada, 58—59. 6. In this text the spirit of the man who, still alive. has destroyed mania and has achieved liberation is also likened to a diamond.

The Sanskrit term vajra (Tibetan: dorje) includes both these meanings—lightning or diamond—and has been particularly used in Tibetan Buddhism to designate the essence of illumination and the nature of one who is made of illumination.

At the same time, it also designates the scepter of the supreme representatives of Lamaist spiritual authority. This symbolism would take us much further in terms of comparative mythology—as far as the lightning- force symbolized by prehistoric hyperborean axes and the symbolism of the lightning that always accompanied divine "Olympian" figures of the Aryan civilizations.

The "path of the vajra," or the "path of the diamond and of lightning (vajra-yāna), is the designation of Tantric and magic Buddhism. on which cf. The Yoga of Power. 7. Majjh., 10; 85. On this subject we can recall the words attributed to the Buddha by the Vajrasamādhisūtra, when he said that the passage of fifty years did not represent a period of time, but only the awakening of a thought (apud Suzuki). 8.

Prajfiaparamita, texts in M. Walleser (Göttingen, 1914), 19, p. 120. 9. Samyutt., 35.203. 10. Angutt., 4.36. 11. Jataka, 70: "Not a good victory is that, after which you may still be beaten. A good victory is that through which you become invincible." 12.

Majjh., 105. 13. Dhammapada, 124. 14. Majjh., 76. 15. Dīgha, 13.73. 16. Samyutt., 3.119. 17. Formichi, Apologia del buddhismo (Rome, 1925), p. 29. The Buddha had declared that, had he so wished, he could even have lived for aeons (cf.

Dīgha, 16.3.3). On the power of the Buddhas and of certain Ariya of prolonging life or of dissolving the vital energies, cf. Abhidharmakoša, 2.10; 7.41. 18. Samyutt., 35.87, Majjh., 144. 19. Suttanipāta, 4.10.9. Udāna (3.10): "Those who believe that they can go out of existence by means of nonexistence will not free themselves from existence."

Buddhism condemns both thirst for existence and thirst for nonexistence (bhava-vibhava-tanhā). 20. Milindapatiha, 195, I ff. (W. 436). 21. Angutt., 8.70. 22. Digha, 16.6.10. 24. Ibid., 16.6.8—9; Samyutt., 6.5. 25. Angutt., 10.92. 26.

Ibid.; 6.97; Majjh., 68. 28. Angutt., 4.87. 29. Ibid., 3.86. 30. Angutt., 10.206; 3.98. With regard to the sankhara and to the upadhi, that is, to the potentialities of a possible fresh combustion, normal psychological consciousness must not be taken as the final criterion.

It may be that with ageing and decay of the organs, a tendency or craving that was alive and unmastered before, may no longer make itself felt. But as a sankhara, it has not therefore vanished: it has only returned to its latent state, and is waiting for a fresh occasion.