Thus were Siddhartha’s thoughts, this was his thirst, this was his suffering.

Often he spoke to himself from a Chandogya-Upanishad the words:  “Truly, the name of the Brahman is satyam—­verily, he who knows such a thing, will enter the heavenly world every day.”  Often, it seemed near, the heavenly world, but never he had reached it completely, never he had quenched the ultimate thirst.  And among all the wise and wisest men, he knew and whose instructions he had received, among all of them there was no one, who had reached it completely, the heavenly world, who had quenched it completely, the eternal thirst.

“Govinda,” Siddhartha spoke to his friend, “Govinda, my dear, come with me under the Banyan tree, let’s practise meditation.”

They went to the Banyan tree, they sat down, Siddhartha right here, Govinda twenty paces away.  While putting himself down, ready to speak the Om, Siddhartha repeated murmuring the verse: 

Om is the bow, the arrow is soul,
The Brahman is the arrow’s target,
That one should incessantly hit.

After the usual time of the exercise in meditation had passed, Govinda rose.  The evening had come, it was time to perform the evening’s ablution.  He called Siddhartha’s name.  Siddhartha did not answer.  Siddhartha sat there lost in thought, his eyes were rigidly focused towards a very distant target, the tip of his tongue was protruding a little between the teeth, he seemed not to breathe.  Thus sat he, wrapped up in contemplation, thinking Om, his soul sent after the Brahman as an arrow.

Once, Samanas had travelled through Siddhartha’s town, ascetics on a pilgrimage, three skinny, withered men, neither old nor young, with dusty and bloody shoulders, almost naked, scorched by the sun, surrounded by loneliness, strangers and enemies to the world, strangers and lank jackals in the realm of humans.  Behind them blew a hot scent of quiet passion, of destructive service, of merciless self-denial.

In the evening, after the hour of contemplation, Siddhartha spoke to Govinda:  “Early tomorrow morning, my friend, Siddhartha will go to the Samanas.  He will become a Samana.”

Govinda turned pale, when he heard these words and read the decision in the motionless face of his friend, unstoppable like the arrow shot from the bow.  Soon and with the first glance, Govinda realized:  Now it is beginning, now Siddhartha is taking his own way, now his fate is beginning to sprout, and with his, my own.  And he turned pale like a dry banana-skin.

“O Siddhartha,” he exclaimed, “will your father permit you to do that?”

Siddhartha looked over as if he was just waking up.  Arrow-fast he read in Govinda´s soul, read the fear, read the submission.

“O Govinda,” he spoke quietly, “let’s not waste words.  Tomorrow, at daybreak I will begin the life of the Samanas.  Speak no more of it.”

Siddhartha entered the chamber, where his father was sitting on a mat of bast, and stepped behind his father and remained standing there, until his father felt that someone was standing behind him.  Quoth the Brahman:  “Is that you, Siddhartha?  Then say what you came to say.”