Chapter Three

This was said by the Buddha, the Perfected One: that is what I heard.

“Mendicants, formless states are more peaceful than states of form; cessation is more peaceful than formless states.”

The Buddha spoke this matter.

On this it is said:

“There are beings in the realm of luminous form,

and others stuck in the formless.

Not understanding cessation,

they return in future lives.

But the people who completely understand form,

not stuck in the formless,

released in cessation—

they are conquerors of death.

Having directly experienced <j>the element free of death,

free of attachments;

having realized relinquishment

of attachments, the undefiled

fully awakened Buddha teaches

the sorrowless, stainless state.”

This too is a matter that was spoken by the Blessed One: that is what I heard.