Mahâ-Parinibbâna-Suttanta: The Book of the Great Decease

46. Then the Blessed One instructed and aroused and incited and gladdened Pukkusa, the young Mallian, with religious discourse. And Pukkusa, the young Mallian, when he had been instructed and aroused and incited and gladdened by the Blessed One with religious discourse, arose from his seat, and bowed down before the Blessed One; and keeping him on his right hand as he past him, departed thence. ------------------------ 47. Now not long after the Mallian Pukkusa had Ânanda placed that pair of robes of cloth of gold, burnished and ready for wear, on the body of the Blessed One, and when it was so p. 81 placed on the body of the Blessed One it appeared to have lost its splendour[1]! 48. And the venerable Ânanda said to the Blessed One: 'How wonderful a thing is it, Lord, and how marvellous, that the colour of the skin of the Blessed One should be so clear, so exceeding bright! For when I placed even this pair of robes of burnished cloth of gold and ready for wear on the body of the Blessed One, lo! it seemed as if it had lost its splendour!' 49. 'It is even so, Ânanda. Ânanda, there: are two occasions on which the colour of the skin of a Tathâgata becomes clear and exceeding bright. What are the two?' 50. 'On the night, Ânanda, on which a Tathâgata attains to the supreme and perfect insight, and on the night in which he passes finally away in that utter passing away which leaves nothing whatever to remain--on these two occasions the colour of the skin of the Tathâgata becomes clear and exceeding bright.