Note 7 — Chapter LXIV

When the snake-god had gone, the three friends said to one another, “If it is impossible to guard one’s wife by enclosing her in one’s own body, what chance is there of keeping her safe in a house? Out on them all!” So they spent the night in contentment, and next morning went on to the forest. There they became completely chastened in mind, with hearts quieted by practising the four meditations,7 which were not interfered with by their friendship, and they became gentle to all creatures, and attained perfection in contemplation, which produces unequalled absolute beatification; and all three in due course destroyed the inborn darkness of their souls, and became liberated from the necessity of future births. But their wicked wives fell into a miserable state by the ripening of their own sin, and were soon ruined, losing both this and the next world.