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### Sutta Nipata IV.1

# Kama Sutta

# Sensual Pleasure

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> If one, longing for sensual pleasure,
> achieves it, yes,
> he's enraptured at heart.
> The mortal gets what he wants.
> But if for that person
> -- longing, desiring --
> the pleasures diminish,
> he's shattered,
> as if shot with an arrow.

> Whoever avoids sensual desires
> -- as he would, with his foot,
> the head of a snake --
> goes beyond, mindful,
> this attachment in the world.

> A man who is greedy
> for fields, land, gold,
> cattle, horses,
> servants, employees,
> women, relatives,
> many sensual pleasures,
> is overpowered with weakness
> and trampled by trouble,
> for pain invades him
> as water, a cracked boat.

> So one, always mindful,
> should avoid sensual desires.
> Letting them go,
> he'd cross over the flood
> like one who, having bailed out the boat,
> has reached the far shore.

See also: MN 13; Ud VII.3-4; AN VI.63

Revised: Wed 16 May 2001