Gotama was presented with overwhelming evidence that `life was good': For example, he was given 3 palaces, to optimize the atmospheric conditions according to the season, where all servants\workers were female. But not just materialistically, also spiritually, he reached what was considered in those days the highest mental state - a.k.a the 8th Jhana - a.k.a the base of neither perception or non-perception - which according to the belief of that day, guarantees rebirth in a plane where life lasts trillions and trillions of years (this maybe a pessimistic estimate) and pretty much each moment is full of bliss that is many-fold times greater than the finest sensual experience a human is capable of experiencing.
It striked me as very mathematician-like that in this situation where any `normal' person would be completely satisfied - Gotama asked `well.. still in such a life, can I really be sure there is no suffering at all?'
