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The venerable Mahāmoggallāna enumerates sixteen unwholesome qualities, such as being irritable, a denigrator, and deceitful, that make someone difficult to admonish. He then teaches the method of self-inference—understanding that our flaws are just as disagreeable to others as theirs are to us.

When a misguided monk clings to the idea of an unchanging consciousness that “wanders through rebirths,” the Buddha corrects him, revealing the truth of dependent co-arising. Consciousness, like fire, arises only through conditions. Tracing the cycle of existence from the four nutriments and conception to the snare of sensory reaction, he shows the way to the complete exhaustion of craving.

The Buddha shows the wanderer Dīghanakha how obstinately clinging to the view that “nothing is acceptable” inevitably causes disputes and vexation. He then teaches the impermanence of the body and the naturally wearing-away nature of feelings. Hearing this, Sāriputta attains full liberation through non-clinging, while Dīghanakha attains the stainless Dhamma eye.

The young brahmin Subha asks the Buddha why human beings experience such vast disparities in lifespan, health, wealth, and wisdom. The Buddha explains that beings are the owners and heirs of their actions. He details specific unwholesome and wholesome behaviors, showing exactly how each shapes future rebirths and human conditions.

The monk Bhaddāli spends months in remorse after refusing to follow the Buddha’s rule to eat only one meal a day. The Buddha explains that training rules are established only to curb the arising of taints in a growing Saṅgha. He then compares a monk's gradual training to the taming of a wild, fine thoroughbred colt.

The Buddha illustrates that his true inheritance is the Dhamma, not material possessions. Venerable Sāriputta clarifies the practice of seclusion by listing numerous harmful qualities to abandon and the Middle Way that leads to abandoning of them, to clear vision, wisdom, tranquility, to full awakening.

The Buddha uses the simile of a defiled cloth to explain how the mind can be similarly defiled by various impurities, and how it can be purified by abandoning them. And it is through this very practice that one arrives at unshakeable faith in the Buddha, the Dhamma, and the Saṅgha. The Buddha also addresses a brahmin in verses who believes in purification by bathing in river.

The Buddha distinguishes pleasant abidings in the here and now from the way of effacement leading upwards to complete quenching. Effacement is shown as the gradual chipping away of defilements through restraint, cultivation of the noble eightfold path, and diligent training, culminating in the complete freedom of Nibbāna.

The Buddha describes the qualities of true disciples, and those who do not grow in the Dhamma.

The Buddha recounts his striving and meditation under the Nerañjarā river, where he was approached by Māra. The Buddha rejects Māra's temptations and describes the qualities of a true practitioner who conquers Māra's army.

The Buddha describes that disputes arise not from many truths, but from people clinging to their own views out of conceit. By labeling others "fools" to affirm their own skill, they create conflict. The path to peace lies not in proving one's view, but in abandoning all judgments.

Among those entrenched in views, arguing “This alone is truth,” the Buddha calls praise won by such to be a small matter. Seeing safety in the ground of non-dispute, the wise do not seek purity by precepts and vows or by what is seen, heard, or sensed. The sage ends craving for various states of existence and stands equanimous.