Sarat Chandra Das —Life and 
118 
[No. 
beings. At the time of his departure he promised to return there some 
time in future. He returned to Nalendra loaded with costly presents and 
gems of inestimable value and also with the religious volume called Naga- 
sabasrika. It was for this connection with the Nagas that he obtained 
the name of Nagarjuna. 
In the country of Radha he erected many chapels and chaityas. On 
bis way to Uttarakuru, in the city of Salama or Salamana, he met with 
a boy named Jetaka, by examining the marks of whose palms, he predicted 
that the boy would one day become a king. Arrived in Uttarakuru he 
went to bathe in a river after placing his raiments on a tree. As he was 
making his ablutions he saw a native taking his clothes away, at which he 
stopped him begging him not to remove his raiments. The native greatly 
wondered that Nagarjuna should claim his clothes. For in Uttarakuru 
there is no distinction of * individual property. There all property is 
common. In Uttarakuru Nagarjuna stayed for three months and 
instructed the people in the sacred religion. On his return he found 
that the boy Jetaka had become a king as he had predicted. Jetaka, having 
great faith in his saintly character, presented him with costly treasures. 
Nagarjuna returned to his country and erected many chaityas and temples, 
composed many works on science, medicine, astronomy and alchemy. After 
the death of Saraha Bhadra, the office of high priest fell upon Nagarjuna 
which he managed with great ability and indefatigable zeal. He matured 
the Madhyamika philosophy which was only conceived by his illustrious 
teacher Saraha. 
Although he was the head of the now wide-spreading faction, of the 
Mahayana school, yet he did not fail to exert himself for the well-being 
of the STavakas or the followers of the Hinayana school, by which 
name the STavakas henceforth came to be distinguished. They equally 
enjoyed the bounties of his saintly character. He established discipline 
among his own congregation by expelling eight thousand monks whose 
character, nay purity of morals, was open to suspicion. By these acts 
he became the recognized head of the whole Buddhist church. About 
this time the germ of a third schism was manifested among his followers 
which eventually developed itself as the Yogacharya school. 
During the presidency of Nagarjuna, Vajrasana (Buddha Gaya) was 
the head quarter of the STavakas or the followers of the Hinayana (little 
vehicle) school, but having fallen into decay, Nalendra in wealth and 
splendour eclipsed the seat of Buddha’s hermitage. Once a wild elephant 
was found to damage the sacred Bodhi-druma (tree of wisdom), when Nagar¬ 
juna caused two stone pillars to be erected for its support. This expedient 
answered well for several years, when, on the repetition of a similar injury, 
Nagarjuna surrounded the great temple Mahagandhola or the mansion of 
