Craving is Like a Maruka

“Oh good man! Why is craving like a maruka [wisteria] seed? For example, a bird can peck it and it can fall to the ground, amid the waste, or it can be carried by the wind to beneath a tree, where it grows and winds itself around a ficus (niagrodha), so that the tree cannot grow and finally dies. The same goes with the maruka seed of craving. It winds itself around the good done by common mortals and finally kills him. [The good] having died, it [the common mortal] ends in the three unfortunate realms, except for the Bodhisattva. This is why we say that the things which one gets are as in the case of the maruka.”

Read More on the Nirvana Sutra, Chapter 20 - On Holy Actions 2.