Pali. Text Society * Manual of a Mystic BEING A TRANSLATION FROM THE PALI AND SINHALESE WORK ENTITLED THE YOGAVACHARA’S MANUAL BY F. L. WOODWARD, M.A. Canvas. PRINCIPAL OF MAMINDA BUDDHIST COLLEGE, GALLE, CEYLON EDITED, WITH INTRODUCTORY ESSAY, BY MRS. RHYS DAVIDS London PUBLISHED FOR le eae TEXT SOCIETY HUMPHREY MILFORD OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE, AMEN CORNER, E.C. 1916EDITOR'S PREFACE Iv his Introduction to the edition he published twenty years ago of the original of this little work, my husband describes that original as follows: “The unique MS. on which the following edition is based is at Bambara-galla Wiharé, in Teldeniya, Ceylon.” Its existence there was ascertained by the Anigarika H. Dharmapila in the spring of 1892. Mr. D. B. Jayatilaka, now barrister of Colombo, accompanied by the late Mr. T. B. Parnatella, visited the Wihara and obtained permission to borrow the palm leaf MS. and havea copy made, A scribe was engaged by Mr. Jayatilaka, with the result that, in August of the following year, H. Dharmapala placed the copy in my husband’s hands at a Kentish village, and went on his way to the Parliament of Religions at Chicago. This loaned copy was returned to Ceylon after the P.'T.S. edition was published, Rhys Davids analyzed the text of the MS. and found it unsatisfactory, both as to the copy and as to its source. The former showed signs of hasty and inaccurate work; the latter suggested the work of an earlier scribe, conversant, no doubt, with Singbalese, but unfamiliar with Pali. ‘To obtain from other Wihira libraries other MSS. of this unnamed and un- known work was impracticable. Nevertheless my husband thought it worth while to bring out a P..S. edition on the PLS. principle that, in pioneer work, not to wait on counsels ‘of perfection is the more intelligent method. “ There is little doubt,” he wrote, “as to the great interest and importance, both from the historical and from the psychological point of view, of the subject treated in this manual. We have no other work in Buddhist literature, either Pali or Sanskrit, devoted to the details of Jhina and Samadhi. It is highly v