[75] "Bhikkhus, I shall teach you a further six principles of non-decline (aparihāniyā dhammā). Listen to it, attend closely, and I shall speak." "Even so, venerable sir," those bhikkhus replied to the Blessed One. The Blessed One said this:
"Bhikkhus, so long as the bhikkhus maintain bodily acts of loving-kindness (mettā) toward their companions in the holy life (sabrahmacārī), both openly and in private, only growth may be expected for the bhikkhus, not decline. So long as the bhikkhus maintain verbal acts of loving-kindness … maintain mental acts of loving-kindness toward their companions in the holy life, both openly and in private, only growth may be expected for the bhikkhus, not decline. So long as the bhikkhus, with regard to those righteous gains, righteously obtained—even so little as the contents of an alms-bowl—will be ones who use such gains without reserving them, using them in common with their virtuous companions in the holy life, only growth may be expected for the bhikkhus, not decline. So long as the bhikkhus dwell possessed of virtue (sīla) in common with their companions in the holy life, both openly and in private—in such virtues as are unbroken, untorn, unblemished, unmottled, liberating, praised by the wise, not grasped at, conducive to concentration (samādhi)—only growth may be expected for the bhikkhus, not decline. So long as the bhikkhus dwell possessed in common with their companions in the holy life, both openly and in private, of that view which is noble and emancipating, leading the one who acts in accordance with it to the complete destruction of suffering (dukkha), only growth may be expected for the bhikkhus, not decline.
Bhikkhus, so long as these six principles of non-decline shall endure among the bhikkhus, and the bhikkhus shall be seen established in these six principles of non-decline, only growth may be expected for the bhikkhus, not decline."
There too, while dwelling at Rājagaha on Mount Gijjhakūṭa, the Blessed One gave this same Dhamma talk to the bhikkhus many times: "Such is virtue, such is concentration, such is wisdom (paññā). Concentration imbued with virtue is of great fruit, of great benefit; wisdom imbued with concentration is of great fruit, of great benefit; the mind (citta) imbued with wisdom is rightly liberated from the taints (āsava), namely: the taint of sensuality, the taint of existence, and the taint of ignorance."
English translation from the Pali (Siam Raṭṭha edition) — under review, not for citation.