Anthology of Discourses 4.7

With Tissametteyya

“When someone indulges in sex,”

said Venerable Tissametteyya,

“tell us, good fellow: what trouble befalls them?

After hearing your instruction,

we shall train in seclusion.”

“When someone indulges in sex,”

replied the Buddha,

“they forget their instructions

and go the wrong way—

that is something ignoble in them.

Someone who formerly lived alone

and then resorts to sex

is like a chariot careening off-track;

in the world they call them a low, ordinary person.

Their former fame and reputation

also fall away.

Seeing this, they’d train

to give up sex.

Oppressed by thoughts,

they brood like a wretch.

When they hear what others are saying,

that sort is embarrassed.

Then they lash out with verbal daggers

when reproached by others.

This is their great blind spot;

they sink to lies.

They once were considered astute,

committed to the solitary life.

But then they indulged in sex,

dragged along by desire like a dullard.

Knowing this danger

in falling from a former state here,

a sage would firmly resolve to wander alone,

and would not resort to sex.

They’d train themselves only in seclusion;

this, for the noble ones, is highest.

One who’d not think themselves ‘best’ due to that

has truly drawn near to extinguishment.

People tied to sensual pleasures envy them:

the isolated, wandering sage

who has crossed the flood,

unconcerned for sensual pleasures.”