Art. I.—Two Játakas. The original Páli Text, with an English Translation

Extract

The two Játakas I here lay before the public contain, as will be seen, two fables which, in the tale that forms the framework of the second book of the Pancatantra, were combined into one. Only the main features, however, are the same, the details differing greatly; and the same is the case in all the other tales which the Játakas have in common with the Pancatantra and the Hitopadeça. But, as the MSS. of these two works disagree so much that there are almost as many texts as there are MSS. (“ut pœne quot codices, tot textus esse dicere possis,” Kosegarten, p. vi), new editions of both of them, based on the oldest MSS. that can be found in India, would be of great value; and if once the oldest MS. in existence had been discovered, I should particularly recommend its publication without any alloy from other MSS., that we might be sure we have one clear, self-consistent text. I think that if this had been done, the similarity between the Singhalese (Pali) and the continental (Sanscrit) fables would appear greater; the Pancatantra being originally, as Prof. Benfey has clearly shown, a Buddhistic work. If we look at the first of the two following fables, it will be seen that the truth to be expounded is the old one, couched by Sallust (Jugurtha 10), in the words, concordia parvse res crescunt, discordia maxumse dilabuntur, or in modern form: union is strength, disunion weakness.