Yet it is not impossible that the first opposition to sacerdotalism may have been due to Jaina influences, and that Indian rationalistic speculation may have been inaugurated by early Jaina leaders. We know that the Buddhist king As′oka, in his inscriptions—which are referred to the third centuryB.C.—mentions the Jainas under the name of Nirgrantha, as if well established and well known in his time. We know, too, what has happened in our own country. Not long ago there was a reaction from extreme Evangelical religious thought in England. But because that reactionary movement is called by the name of a particular leader, it by no means follows that he was chronologically the first to set it in action. In the same way it may possibly turn out to be a fact that the Jaina Pārs′vanātha, rather than the Buddha Gautama, was the first excogitator of the heretical ideas and theories common to both. It seems to me, indeed, not improbable that Jainism, which is now at length assimilating itself to Hindūism, maintained its ground more persistently in India, not only because, unlike Buddhism, it sullenly refused to fraternize with Brāhmanism, and to court converts from other creeds, but because the lines of demarcation which separated it from the orthodox system were in some essential points more sharp and decided thanthose which separated Buddhism. It is, at any rate, a fact that the Jainas claim for their system a prior origin to that of Buddhism, and even affirm that Gautama Buddha was a pupil of their chief Jina, Mahāvīra. Nor will it surprise us that the legendary history of Mahāvīra, who succeeded Pārs′vanātha, and was the first real propagator of the Jaina creed, favours the theory of such a priority. True, Mahāvīra is described as the son of Siddhārtha, which is an epithet given to the Buddha. But he is also said to have had a pupil named Gautama, and his death is fixed by the concurrent testimony of both parties of Jainas, who follow different reckonings, at a date corresponding to aboutB.C.526 or 527, the usual date assigned by modern research to the Nirvāna or death of Buddha being 477 or 478.
But it must not be supposed that Pārs′vanātha and his successor Mahāvīra, are regarded by the Jainas as their first supreme Jinas. They were preceded by twenty-two other mythical leaders and patriarchs, beginning with Rishabha,7whose fabulous lives protracted to millions of years, and whose fabulous statures, proportionally extended, were probably invented in recent times, that the Jaina system might not be outdone by that of either Brāhmans or Buddhists.
It is well known that the code of Manu—which is the best exponent of Brāhmanism—supposes a constant succession of religious guides through an infinite succession of cycles. These cycles are called Kalpas. Every Kalpa or Æon of time begins with a new creation, and ends with a universal dissolution of all existing things—including Brahmā, Vishnu, S′iva, gods, demons, men, and animals—into Brahmă, or the One sole impersonal self-existent Soul of the Universe. In the interval between each creation and dissolution there are fourteen periods, presided over by fourteen successive patriarchs or progenitors of the human race called Manus, who, as their name implies, are the authors of all human wisdom, and who create a succession of Sages and Saints (Rishis and Munis), for mankind's guidance and instruction.
The Buddhists, also, have their cycles of time, presided over by twenty-four Buddhas, or 'perfectly enlightened men,' Gautama being (according to the Northern reckoning) the seventh of the series. Similarly the Jainas have their vast periods superintended by twenty-four Jinas, or 'self-conquering sages.' The notion is that alternate periods of degeneracy and amelioration succeed each other with symmetrical regularity. Each cycle embraces vast terms of years; for in the determination of the world's epochs Indian arithmeticians anticipatedcenturies ago the wildest hypotheses of modern European science. A single Kalpa, or Æon, of the Brāhmans consists of 4,320,000,000 years. It is divided into a thousand periods of four ages (called Satya, Treta, Dvāpara, and Kali), under which there is gradual degeneration until the depths of degeneracy are reached in the Kali age. The Buddhist Kalpas are similar, but the Jaina cycles have a distinctive character of their own. They proceed in pairs, one of which is called 'descending,' (Avasarpinī), and the other 'ascending,' (Utsarpinī). Of these the descending cycle has six stages, or periods, each comprising one hundred million years, and called 'good-good,' 'good,' 'good-bad,' 'bad-good,' 'bad,' 'bad-bad,' during which mankind gradually deteriorates; while the ascending cycle has also six similar periods called 'bad-bad,' 'bad,' 'bad-good,' 'good-bad,' 'good,' 'good-good,' during which the human race gradually improves till it reaches the culminating pinnacle of absolute perfection. In illustration we are told to imagine a vast serpent, whose body, coiled round in infinite space in an endless circle, supports and guides the movement of the earth in its eternal progress. The head and tail of the serpent meet, and the notion is that the earth's movement alternates after the manner of the oscillating motion of a balance-wheel acted on by the coiling and uncoiling of a steel spring. First the earth moves from the head towards the tail in a downward course, and then reversing the direction moves upwards from the tail to the head. At present we are supposed to be in the descending cycle. Twenty-four Jinas have already appeared in this cycle, while twenty-four were manifested in the past ascending cycle, and twenty-four will be manifested in the future.
In Brāhmanism, Buddhism, and Jainism, the idea seems to be that the tendency to deterioration would very soon land mankind in a condition of hopeless degeneracy unless counteracted by the remedial influences of great teachers, prophets, and deliverers. In the legendary history of the Buddha Gautama, he is described in terms which almost assimilate his character to the Christian conception of a Redeemer: he is even reported to have said—"Let all the evils (or sins) flowing from the corruption of the fourth or degenerate age (calledKali) fall upon me, but let the world be redeemed."
And what are the precise character and functions of a Jina? This inquiry must, of course, form an important part of our present subject, and the reply is really involved in the answer to another question: What is the great end and object of Jainism? Briefly, it may be stated that Jainism, like Brāhmanism and Buddhism, aims at getting rid of the burden of repeated existences. Three root-ideas may be said to lie at the foundation of all three systems:—first, that personal existence is protracted through an innumerable succession of bodies by the almighty power of man's own acts; secondly, that mundane life is an evil, and that man finds his perfection in the cessation of all acts, and the consequent extinction of all personal existence; thirdly, that such perfection is alone attainedthrough self-mortification, abstract meditation, and true knowledge. In these crucial doctrines, the theory of Brāhmanism is superior to that of Buddhism and Jainism. According to the Brāhmans, the living soul of man has an eternal existence both retrospectively and prospectively, and only exists separately from the One Supreme Eternal Soul because that Supreme Soul wills the temporary separate personality of countless individual spirits, dissevering them from his own essence and causing them to pass through a succession of bodies, till, after a long course of discipline, they are permitted to blend once more with their great Eternal Source. With the Brāhmans existence in the abstract is not an evil. It is only an evil when it involves the continued separation of the personal soul from the impersonal Eternal Soul of the Universe.
Very different is the doctrine of Buddhists and Jains. With them there is no Supreme Being, no Supreme Divine Eternal Soul, no separate human eternal soul. Nor can there be any true soul-transmigration. A Buddhist and a Jaina believe that the only eternal thing is matter. The universe consists of eternal atoms which by their own inherent creative force are perpetually developing countless forms of being in ever-recurring cycles of creation and dissolution, re-creation and re-dissolution. This is symbolized by a wheel revolving for ever in perpetual progression and retrogression.8
What then becomes of the doctrine of transmigration of souls, which is said to be held even more strongly by Buddhists and Jains than by Hindūs? It is thus explained. Every human being is composed of certain constituents (called by Buddhists the five Skandhas). These comprehend body, soul, and mind, with all the organs of feeling and sensation. They are all dissolved at death, and absolute extinction would follow, were it not for the inextinguishable, imperishable, omnipotent force ofKarmanor Act. No sooner are the constituents of one stage of existence dissolved than a new set is created by the force of acts done and character formed in the previous stage. Soul-transmigration with Buddhists is simply a concatenation of separate existences connected by the iron chain of act. A man's own acts generate a force which may be compared to those of chemistry, magnetism, or electricity—a force which periodically re-creates the whole man, and perpetuates his personal identity (notwithstanding the loss of memory) through the whole series of his separate existences, whether it obliges him to ascend or descend in the scale of being. It may safely be affirmed that Brāhmans, Buddhists, and Jains all agree in repudiating the idea of vicarious suffering. All concur in rejecting the notion of a representative man—whether he be a Manu, a Rishi, a Buddha, or a Jina—suffering as a substituted victim for the rest of mankind. Every being brought into the world must suffer in his own person the consequences of his own deeds committed either in present or former states of being.It is not sufficient that he be rewarded in a temporary heaven, or punished in a temporary hell. Neither heaven nor hell has power to extinguish the accumulated efficacy of good or bad acts committed by the same person during a long succession of existences. Such accumulated acts must inevitably and irresistibly drag him down into other mundane forms, until at length their potency is destroyed by his attainment of perfect self-discipline and self-knowledge in some final culminating condition of being, terminated by complete self-annihilation.
And thus we are brought to a clear understanding of the true character of a Jina or self-conquering Saint (from the Sanskrit rootji, to conquer). A Jina is with the Jains very nearly what a Buddha is with the Buddhists.
He represents the perfection of humanity, the typical man, who has conquered self and attained a condition so perfect that he not only ceases to act, but is able to extinguish the power of former acts; a human being who is released from the obligation of further transmigration, and looks forward to death as the absolute extinction of personal existence. But he is also more than this. He is a being who by virtue of the perfection of his self-mortification (tapas) has acquired the perfection of knowledge, and therefore the right to be a supreme leader and teacher of mankind. He claims far more complete authority and infallibility than the most arrogant Roman Pontiff. He is in his own solitary person an absolutely independent and infallible guide to salvation. Hence he is commonly called aTīrthan-kara, or one who constitutes a Tīrtha9—that is to say, a kind of passage or medium through which bliss may be attained—a kind of ford or bridge leading over the river of life to the elysium of final emancipation. Other names for him areArhat, "venerable;"Sarva-jna, "omniscient;"Bhagavat, "lord."
A Buddha with the Buddhists is a very similar personage. He is a self-conqueror and self-mortifier (tapasvī), like the Jina, and is besides a supreme guide to salvation; but he has achieved his position of Buddhahood more by the perfection of his meditation (yoga, samādhi) than by the completeness of his self-restraint and austerities.
Both Jainas and Buddhists—but especially Jainas—believe in the existence of gods and demons, and spiritual beings of all kinds, whom they often designate by names similar to those used by the Hindūs. These may possess vast supernatural and extra-mundane powers in different degrees and kinds, which they are capable of exerting for the benefit or injury of mankind; but they are inferior in position to the Jina or Buddha. They are merely powerful beings—temporary rulers in temporary heavens and hells.
They may be very formidable and worthy of propitiation, but they are imperfect. They are liable to pass through other stages of existence, or even to be born again in mundane forms, until they arefinally extinguished by the same law of dissolution as the rest of the universe.
Very different is the condition of the perfect saint. He is in a far higher position, for he has but one step to take before plunging into the ocean of non-existence. He is on the verge of the bliss of extinction, and can guide others to it. He can never be dragged down again to earthly imperfection and sin. He alone is a worthy object of adoration. All other beings—divine and demoniacal—are to be dreaded, not worshipped. "There is no god superior to the Arhat," says the Kalpa-sūtra (Stevenson, p. 10). True worship, indeed, is not possible with Jainas any more than with Buddhists. They have no supreme Eternal Being, omniscient and omnipresent, ever at hand to answer prayer, ever living to be an object of meditation, devotion, and love to his creatures.
Yet a Jaina who acts up to the principles of his faith is a slave to a ceaseless round of religious duties.
The late Bishop of Calcutta told me that he once asked a pious Jaina, whom he happened to meet in the act of leaving a temple after a long course of devotion, what he had been asking for in prayer, and to whom he had been praying? He replied, "I have been asking for nothing, and praying to nobody." The fact was he had been meditating on the perfections of some extinct Jina, doing homage to his memory, and using prayer as a mere mechanical act, not directed towards any higher Power capable of granting requests, but believed to have an efficacy of its own in determining the character of his subsequent forms of existence.
It may be said that the Brāhmanical idea of a saint is much the same as that of Buddhists and Jainas. But with Brāhmans the perfect saint is not so solitary and independent in his spiritual pre-eminence. He is one of a numerous band of similar sainted personages. He has endless names and epithets (such as Rishi, Muni, Yogī, Tapasvī, Jitendriya, Yatendriya, Sannyāsī), all of which indicate that he, like the Buddha and Jina, has attained the perfection of knowledge and impassiveness, either by abstract meditation (yoga), or self-mortification (tapas), or mastery over his sensual organs (yama). He may also combine the functions of a true teacher and guide to salvation (Tīrtha). He may even, like the Buddha and Jina, have acquired such powers that any of the secondary gods, including Brahmā, Vishnu, and S′iva, may be subject to him. Finally, he may be himself worshipped as a kind of deity. Yet radically there is an important distinction between the Brāhman and the Jaina saint, for the Brāhman saint makes no pretence to absolute finality and supremacy. However lofty his position, he can never be exalted above the One Supreme Being (Brahma), in whose existence his own personal existence is destined to become absorbed, and union with whose essence constitutes the object of all his hopes, and the aim of all his aspirations.
Nothing, perhaps, better illustrates the difference between Brāhmanism,Buddhism, and Jainism than the daily prayer used in all three systems. That of the Brāhmans is in Sanskrit (from Rig-veda iii. 62. 10), and is addressed to the Supreme Being as giver of life and illumination. It is a prayer for greater knowledge and enlightenment: thus, "Let us meditate on that excellent glory of the divine Vivifier. May He stimulate our understandings." That of the Jainas, also called by them Gāyatrī, is in Māgadhī Prākrit, and is in five short clauses to the following effect:—"I venerate the sages who are worthy of honour (arhat). I venerate the saints who have achieved perfection. I venerate those who direct our religious worship. I venerate spiritual instructors. I venerate holy men (sādhus) in all parts of the world." This is obviously no real prayer, but a mere formula, expressive of veneration for human excellence, like that used by the Buddhists, which is perhaps the simplest of all,—"Reverence to the incomparable Buddha;" or (as in Thibet), "Reverence to the jewel in the lotus."10
Brāhmans, Jains, and Buddhists all alike aim at the attainment of perfect knowledge; but the Brāhman, by his Gāyatrī prayer, acknowledges his dependence on a Supreme Being as the source of all enlightenment; while the formulas of Jains and Buddhists are simply expressive of their belief in the divinity of humanity—the efficacy of human example, and the power of unassisted human effort.
It will be evident from the foregoing outline of the first principles of Jainism, that the whole system hinges on the efficacy of self-mortification (tapas), self-restraint (yama), and asceticism. Only twenty-four supreme saints and Tīrthan-karas can appear in any one cycle of time, but every mortal man may be a self-restrainer (yati). Every one born into the world may be a striver after sanctity (sādhu), and a practiser of austerities (tapasvī). Doubtless, at first there was no distinction between monks, ascetics, and ordinary men, just as in the earliest days of Christianity there was no division into bishops, priests, and laity. All Jainas in ancient times practised austerities, but among such ascetics an important difference arose. One party advocated an entire abandonment of clothing, in token of complete indifference to all worldly ideas and associations. The other party were in favour of wearing white garments. The former were called Dig-ambara, sky-clothed, the latter S′vetāmbara (or, in ancient works, S′veta-pata), white-clothed.110Of these the Dig-ambaras were chronologically the earliest. They were probably the first to form themselves into a regular society. The first Jina, Rishaba, as well as the last Jina, Mahāvīra, are said to have been Dig-ambaras, and to have gone about absolutely naked. Their images represent two entirely nude ascetics, whereas the images of other Jinas, like the Buddhist images, are representations of a sage,generally seated in a contemplative posture, with a robe thrown gracefully over one shoulder.
It is not improbable that the S′vetāmbara division of the Jainas were merely a sect which separated itself from the parent stock in later times, and became in the end numerically the most important, at least in Western India. The Dig-ambaras, however, are still the most numerous faction in Southern India, and at Jaipur in the North.12
And, indeed, it need scarcely be pointed out that ascetics, both wholly naked and partially clothed, are as common under the Brāhmanical system as among Jainas and Buddhists. The god S′iva himself is represented as a Dig-ambara, or naked ascetic, whenever he assumes the character of a Mahā-yogī—that is to say, whenever he enters on a long course of austerity, with an absolutely nude body, covered only with a thick coating of dust and ashes, sitting motionless and wrapped in meditation for thousands of years, that he may teach men by his own example the power attainable through self-mortification and abstract contemplation.
It is true that absolute nudity in public is now prohibited by law, but the Dig-ambara Jainas who take their meals, like orthodox Hindūs, in strict seclusion, are said to remove their clothes in the act of eating. Even in the most crowded thoroughfares the requirements of legal decency are easily satisfied. Any one who travels in India must accustom himself to the sight of plenty of unblushing, self-asserting human flesh. Thousands content themselves with the minimum of clothing represented by a narrow strip of cloth, three or four inches wide, twisted round their loins. Nor ought it to excite any feeling of prudish disgust to find poor, hard-working labourers tilling the ground with a greater area of sun-tanned skin courting the cooling action of air and wind on the burning plains of Asia than would be considered decorous in Europe. As to mendicant devotees, they may still occasionally be seen at great religious gatherings absolutely innocent of even a rag. Nevertheless, they are careful to avoid magisterial penalties. In a secluded part of the city of Patna, I came suddenly on an old female ascetic, who usually sits quite naked in a large barrel, which constitutes her only abode. When I passed her, in company with the collector and magistrate of the district, she rapidly drew a dirty sheet round her body.
In the present day both Dig-ambara and S′vetāmbara Jainas are divided into two classes, corresponding to clergy and laity. When the two sects increased in numbers, all, of course, could not be ascetics. Some were compelled to engage in secular pursuits, and many developed industrious and business-like habits. Hence it happened that a large number became prosperous merchants and traders.
All laymen13among the Jainas are called S′rāvakas, "hearers ordisciples," while the Yatis,14or "self-restraining ascetics," who constitute the only other division of both Jaina sects, are the supposed teachers (Gurus). Many of them, of course, never teach at all. They were formerly called Nirgrantha, "free from worldly ties," and are often known by the general name of Sādhu, "holy men." All are celibates, and most of them are cenobites, not anchorites. Sometimes four or five hundred live together in one monastery, which they call an Upās′raya,15"place of retirement," under a presiding abbot. They dress, like other Hindū ascetics, in yellowish-pink or salmon-coloured garments.16There are also female ascetics (Sādhvinī, or, anciently,Nirgranthī), who may be seen occasionally in public places clothed in dresses of a similar colour. When these good women draw the ends of their robes over their heads to conceal their features, and cover the lower part of their faces with pieces of muslin to prevent animalculæ from entering their mouths, they look very like hooded Roman Catholic nuns. I saw several threading their way through the crowded streets of Ahmedabad, apparently bent, like sisters of mercy, on charitable errands.
Of course, in Jainism anything like a Brāhmanical priesthood would be an impossibility. Jainas reject the whole body of the Veda, Vedic sacrifices and ritual, and hold it to be a heinous sin to kill an animal of any kind, even for religious purposes. They have, however, a Veda of their own, consisting of a series of forty-five sacred writings, collectively called Āgamas. They are all in the Jaina form of the Māgadhī dialect (differing from, yet related to, the Pālī of the Buddhists, the Māgadhī Prākrit of Vararuchi, and the Prākrit of the plays), and are classed under the different heads of Anga, Upānga, Pāinna (Sanskrit,Prakīrnaka), Mūla, Chheda, Anuyoga, and Nandi. Of these the eleven Angas are the most esteemed, but the whole series is equally regarded as S′ruti, or divine revelation. The Māgadhī text is sometimes explained by Sanskrit commentaries, and sometimes by commentaries in the Mārwārī dialect, very common among merchants in the West of India. Some of the best known Angas and Upāngas were procured by me when I was last at Bombay, through the kind assistance of Dr. Bühler; but it appears doubtful whether they would repay the trouble which a complete perusal and thorough examination of such voluminous writings would entail. It may safely be affirmed that their teaching, like that of the Purānas, is anything but consistent or uniform, and that they deal with subjects—such as the formation of the universe, history, geography, and chronology—of which their authors are profoundly ignorant.
The Indian commentator, Mādhavāchārya, in his well-known summary of Hindū sects (called Sarva-dars′ana-sangraha) has given an interesting sketch of the Jainas from his own investigation of their sacred writings. Their philosophers are sometimes called Syād-vādins, "asserters of possibility," because their system propounds seven modes of reconciling opposite views (sapta-bhanga-naya) as to the possibility of anything existing or not existing. All visible objects—all the phenomena of the universe—are distributed under the two principles (tattva) or categories of animate (jīva), and inanimate (a-jīva). Again, all living beings comprised under the former are divided into three classes: (1) eternally perfect, as the Jina; (2) emancipated from the power of acts; (3) bound by acts and worldly associations. Or, again, nine principles are enumerated—namely, life, absence of life, merit (punya), demerit, passion, helps to restraint, helps to freedom from worldly attachments, bondage, emancipation. Inanimate matter is sometimes referred to a principle (tattva) called Pudgala, which it is easier for Jaina philosophers to talk about than to explain.
When we come to the Jaina moral code, we find ourselves transported from the mists of fanciful ideas and arbitrary speculation to a clearer atmosphere and firmer ground. The three gems which every Jaina is required to seek after with earnestness and diligence, are right intuition, right knowledge, and right conduct. The nature of the first two may be inferred from the explanations already given. Right conduct consists in the observance of five duties (vratas), and the avoidance of five sins implied in five prohibitions. The five duties are:—Be merciful to all living things; practise almsgiving and liberality; venerate the perfect sages while living, and worship their images after their decease; confess your sins annually, and mutually forgive each other; observe fasting. The five prohibitions are:—Kill not; lie not; steal not; commit not adultery or impurity; love not the world or worldly honour.
If equal practical importance were attached to these ten precepts, the Jaina system could not fail to conduce in a high degree to the happiness and well-being of its adherents, however perverted their religious sense may be. Unfortunately, undue stress is laid on the first duty and first prohibition, to the comparative neglect of some of the others. In former days, when Buddhism and Jainism were prevalent everywhere, "Kill not" was required to be proclaimed by sound of trumpet in every city daily.17
And, indeed, with all Hindūs respect for life has always been regarded as a supreme obligation. Ahinsā, or avoidance of injury to others in thought, word, and deed, is declared by Manu to be the highest virtue, and its opposite the greatest crime. Not the smallest insect ought to be killed, lest the soul of some relation should be there embodied. Yetall Hindūs admit that life may be taken for religious or sacrificial purposes. Not so Buddhists and Jainas. With them the sacrifice of any kind of life, even for the most sacred purpose, is a heinous crime. In fact, the belief in transmission of personal identity at death through an infinite series of animal existences is so intense that they live in perpetual dread of destroying some beloved relative or friend. The most deadly serpents or venomous scorpions may enshrine the spirits of their fathers or mothers, and are therefore left unharmed. The Jainas far outdo every other Indian sect in carrying the prohibition, "not to kill," to the most preposterous extremes. They strain water before drinking, sweep the ground with a silken brush before sitting down, never eat or drink in the dark, and often wear muslin before their mouths to prevent the risk of swallowing minute insects. They even object to eating figs, or any fruit containing seed, and would consider themselves eternally defiled by simply touching flesh-meat with their hands.
One of the most curious sights in Bombay is the Panjara-pol, or hospital for diseased, crippled, and worn-out animals, established by rich Jaina merchants and benevolent Vaishnava Hindūs in a street outside the Fort. The institution covers several acres of ground, and is richly endowed. Both Jainas and Vaishnavas think it a work of the highest religious merit to contribute liberally towards its support. The animals are well fed and well tended, though it certainly seemed to me, when I visited the place, that the great majority would be more mercifully provided for by the application of a loaded pistol to their heads. I found, as might have been expected, that a large proportion of space was allotted to stalls for sick and infirm oxen, some with bandaged eyes, some with crippled legs, some wrapped up in blankets and lying on straw beds. One huge, bloated, broken-down old bull in the last stage of decrepitude and disease was a pitiable object to behold. Then I noticed in other parts of the building singular specimens of emaciated buffaloes, limping horses, mangy dogs, apoplectic pigs, paralytic donkeys, featherless vultures, melancholy monkeys, comatose tortoises, besides a strange medley of cats, rats and mice, small birds, reptiles, and even insects, in every stage of suffering and disease. In one corner a crane, with a kind of wooden leg, appeared to have spirit enough left to strut in a stately manner amongst a number of dolorous-looking ducks and depressed fowls. The most spiteful animals seemed to be tamed by their sufferings and the care they received. All were being tended, nursed, physicked, and fed, as if it were a sacred duty to prolong the existence of every living creature to the utmost possible limit. It is even said that men are paid to sleep on dirty wooden beds in different parts of the building, that the loathsome vermin with which they are infested may be supplied with their nightly meal of human blood.
Yet I observed on other occasions that both Jainas and Hindūs are sometimes very cruel to animals used for domestic purposes, believingthat the harshest treatment involves no sin provided it stops short of destroying life. The following story, which I have paraphrased freely, from the Jaina Kalpa-sūtra (Stevenson, p. 11) may be taken as an illustration:18—
"There was a certain Brāhman in the city of Pushpavatī whose father and mother died. In process of time both parents were born again in their own son's house, the father as a bullock, the mother as a female dog. By-and-by the S′rāddha, or festive-day for the worship of deceased parents and forefathers, came round. In the morning the son set the bullock to labour hard, that a supply of rice and milk might be ready for the priests invited to the festival. When they were about to begin eating, the female dog, in which was the mother's soul, seeing something poisonous fall into the milk, snatched it away with her mouth. Upon that her son, not understanding the dog's action, flew into a passion and almost broke her back with a stick. In the evening the bullock was tied up in a cowhouse, but no food given to him after his day's toil. Both animals had become conscious of their previous state of existence, and the bullock, looking at the female dog, exclaimed, 'Alas! what have we both suffered this day through the cruelty of our wicked son!'"
"There was a certain Brāhman in the city of Pushpavatī whose father and mother died. In process of time both parents were born again in their own son's house, the father as a bullock, the mother as a female dog. By-and-by the S′rāddha, or festive-day for the worship of deceased parents and forefathers, came round. In the morning the son set the bullock to labour hard, that a supply of rice and milk might be ready for the priests invited to the festival. When they were about to begin eating, the female dog, in which was the mother's soul, seeing something poisonous fall into the milk, snatched it away with her mouth. Upon that her son, not understanding the dog's action, flew into a passion and almost broke her back with a stick. In the evening the bullock was tied up in a cowhouse, but no food given to him after his day's toil. Both animals had become conscious of their previous state of existence, and the bullock, looking at the female dog, exclaimed, 'Alas! what have we both suffered this day through the cruelty of our wicked son!'"
As to the other precepts of the Jaina moral code, it is noteworthy that the practice of confessing sins to a priestly order of men probably existed in full force among the Jainas long before its introduction into the Christian system. A pious Jaina ought to confess at least once a year, or if his conscience happens to be burdened by the weight of any recent crime—such, for example, as the accidental killing of a noxious insect—he is bound to betake himself to the confessional without delay. The stated observance of this duty is called Pratikramana, because on a particular day the penitent repairs solemnly to a priestly Yati, who hears his confession, pronounces absolution, and imposes a penance.
The penances inflicted generally consist of various kinds of fasting; but it must be observed that fasting is with Jainas a duty incumbent on all. It is a duty only second to that of not killing. Fasting (upavāsa) is also practised by Hindūs and Buddhists, and held to be a most effective means of accumulating religious merit. Orthodox Hindūs fast twice a month, on the eleventh day of each fortnight, as well as on the birthday of Krishna (Janmāshtamī), and the night sacred to S′iva (S′iva-rātri). On some fast days fruits may be eaten, but no cooked food of any kind.
With Buddhists and Jainas the season of fasting, religious meditation, and recitation of sacred texts, far outdoes our Lenten period. The Buddhists in some parts of the world call their fasting season Wasso (corrupted from the SanskritUpavāsa). That of the Jainas is called Pajjūsan or Pachchūsan (for SanskritParyushana). The S′vetāmbara Jainas fast for the fifty days preceding the fifth of the month Bhādra, the Dig-ambaras for the seventy following days. In both cases the Pajjūsan corresponds generally to the rainy season or its close. Possibly the practice of fasting during that period may be intended as an expiationfor the supposed guilt incurred by the unintentional destruction of damp-engendered insects.
In regard to the duty of worshipping images, this also, like the last duty, is incumbent on all. But it is worthy of remark that images were at first only used as memorials or as simple decorations, in places consecrated to pure forms of worship. Idolatry has always been a later innovation. It has never belonged to the original constitution of any religious system. One or two differences between Hindū, Buddha, and Jaina images should be noted. Hindū images (excepting that of the ascetic form of S′iva) are often profusely decorated, while Buddha and Jaina idols are always left unadorned, though sometimes cut out of the finest marble, and often having a nimbus19round their heads. Twenty-two of the Jina images, as well as the seven Buddhas, are represented with a coarse garment thrown over the left shoulder, the other shoulder being bare. Those of the first and last Jinas (Rishabha and Mahāvīra) are completely nude; and Jina images, like some of those of the Buddha, are often erect. Moreover, the idols of the Buddha Gautama represent him in four principal attitudes. He is (1) seated in deep contemplation; or (2) is seated while engaged in teaching, with the tip of the forefinger of one hand applied to the fingers of the other hand; or (3) he is a mendicant ascetic in a standing posture; or (4) he is recumbent just before his decease. In the first or contemplative attitude, he is indifferent to everything except intense concentration of thought on the problem of perfect knowledge. According to others, he is supposed to be thinking of nothing, or, if that is impossible, his thoughts are concentrated on the tip of his nose, till he does not even think of that. Or there may be a modification of this meditative attitude, in which his mind is apparently engaged in ecstatic contemplation of the short distance which still separates him from the goal of annihilation. The first contemplative attitude is by far the commonest. The sage is seen seated (generally on a full-blown lotus) with his legs folded under him, the left palm supinate on his lap, and the right hand extended over the right leg. He has pendulous ears, curly hair, and a top-knot on the crown of his head. His garment is thrown gracefully over the left shoulder, leaving the right bare. The modification of this attitude, representing the sage in ecstatic contemplation, has both the palms resting one above the other on the lap, and occasionally holding a circular object, the meaning of which is not well ascertained. In the second or teaching attitude, the great teacher is supposed to be marking off the points of his discourse, or emphasizing them on his fingers. This attitude expresses an important peculiarity, already pointed out, as distinguishing Buddhism from Jainism—namely, that it lays more stress than Jainism on the acquisition and imparting of knowledge. I have never seen a Jina image in a teaching attitude. The recumbent attitude of Buddha is supposed to represent him in the act of dying,and attaining Nirvāna. Pious Buddhists regard this supreme moment in the life of their great leader with as much reverence as Christians regard the death of Christ on the cross. Through the kindness of Sir William Gregory, I was taken to see a colossal recumbent statue of the Buddha, at least thirty feet long,20in the celebrated temple of Kelani, not far from Columbo, in Ceylon. The image appeared to be highly venerated by numerous worshippers, who presented offerings at the shrine. On each side were colossal images of attendants and doorkeepers (dvāra-pāla), and in other parts of the temple figures of Buddha's demon enemies, besides idols of the Hindū deities, Vishnu, S′iva, and Ganes′a. All around the walls of the temple were fresco representations of incidents in the life of the Buddha. A huge bell-shaped Dagoba (Dhātu-garbha), of massive masonry, covered with chunam, was in the garden, on the right side of the temple. It doubtless enshrined ashes or relics of great sanctity. But in all these Dagobas there is no passage to any interior chamber: whatever relics they contain have been bricked up for centuries, and no record is preserved of their history or nature. On the left of the temple were the residences of the high priests and monks, in a well-kept garden overshadowed by an immense Pīpal tree, supposed to represent the sacred tree of knowledge. Both Buddha and Jina images have always certain objects or symbols (chihna) connected with them. Those of the Buddha are generally associated with the tree of knowledge, or a hooded serpent, or a wheel, or a deer.21The seventh Tīrthan-kara of the Jainas is specially associated with the Svastika cross—an auspicious symbol common to Hindūism, Buddhism, and Jainism. Worshippers in Buddhist and Jaina temples may be seen arranging their offerings in the form of this symbol, which is shaped like a Greek cross, with the end of each of the four arms bent round in the same direction. The question as to the origin of the emblem has called forth many learned dissertations from various scholars and archæologists. For my own part, I am inclined to regard it as a mere rude representation of the four arms of Lakshmī, goddess of good fortune, the bent extremities of the arms denoting her four hands.
With regard to the adoration of relics, one or two points of difference between the systems may be pointed out. The Hindūs wholly object to the Buddhist practice of preserving and worshipping the ashes, hair, or teeth of their departed saints. I remarked in the course of my travels that articles of clothing, especially wooden shoes and cloth slippers, used by holy men during life, are sometimes preserved by the Hindūs in sacred shrines, and held in veneration. They must, of course, be removed from the person before actual death has supervened; for it is well known that in the minds of Hindūs an idea of impurity is always inseparable from death. Contamination is supposed to resultfrom contact with the corpses of even their dearest relatives. The mortal frame is not held in veneration as it was by the ancient Egyptians, and as it generally is in Christian countries. Every part of a dead body ought to be got rid of as soon as possible. Hence, it is burnt very soon after death, and the ashes scattered on the surface of sacred rivers or on the sea. Nevertheless, the bodies of great ascetics are exempted from this rule. They are generally buried, not burnt; not, however, because the mere corporeal frame is held in greater veneration, but because the most eminent saints are supposed to lie undecomposed in a kind of trance, resulting from the intense ecstatic meditation (samādhi) to which during life they were devoted. In former days great ascetics were not unfrequently buried alive, and that, too, with their own consent. A crowd of admiring disciples was always ready to assist at the entombment, and it might be said in excuse that the holy men really appeared to be dead, though they were merely speechless, motionless, and senseless, in a kind of meditative catalepsy.
The Jainas hold views similar to those of the Hindūs in regard to the treatment of dead bodies. They never preserve the ashes of their saints in Stūpas, Chaityas, or Dagobas, or worship them, as the Buddhists do.
In connection with this subject I may remark, that what may be called "foot-worship" (pādukā-pūjā), or the veneration of footprints, seems to be common to Hindūs, Buddhists, and Jainas. Even during life, when a Hindū wishes to show great respect for a person of higher rank or position than himself, he reverentially touches his feet. The idea seems to rest on a kind ofa fortioriargument. If the feet, as the lowest members of the body, are treated with honour, how much more is homage rendered to the whole man. Children honour their parents in this manner. They never kiss the faces of either father or mother. In some families, sons prostrate themselves at their fathers' feet. The arms are crossed just above the wrist, both feet are touched, and the hands raised to the forehead.
The notion of honouring the feet as the highest possible act of homage runs through the whole Hindū system. Small shrines may often be observed in different parts of India, sometimes dedicated to holy men, sometimes to Satīs, or faithful wives who have burnt themselves with their husbands. They appear to be quite empty. On closer inspection two footprints may be detected on a little raised altar made of stone. These are called Pādukā, "shoes," but are really the supposed impression of the soles of the feet. In the same way, the wooden clog of the god Brahmā is worshipped at a particular shrine somewhere in Central India, and we know that the footprint of both Buddha and Vishnu at Gayā, and that of Buddha at Adam's Peak, are objects of adoration to millions.
Analogous ideas and practices prevail in Roman Catholic countries. There is a wooden image of Christ on the cross in a church at Vienna,which is so venerated that, although it is a little elevated, some worshippers stand on tiptoe to kiss its feet, while others touch its feet with their fingers, and then raise their fingers to their mouths. Similarly, at Munich, in Bavaria, numbers of worshippers may be seen kissing the feet of an image of the Virgin Mary, and most travellers can testify that images of St. Peter, not to mention the living representative of St. Peter, are treated in a similar manner.
Nothing, however, comes up to the veneration of footprints among Jainas. I visited the magnificent temple erected by Hāthi-Singh at Ahmedabad, as well as the underground shrine dedicated to Ādinath, and another great Jaina temple at Kaira. The first consists of a large quadrangle, approached by a beautifully carved marble gateway. The principal shrine is in the centre. All around the quadrangle is a kind of cloister, in which are about thirty subordinate shrines, each containing the image of a particular Jina or Tīrthan-kara. All the images appeared to me to be of one type, and to resemble those of the contemplative (Dhyānī) Buddha. All are carved out of fine marble, generally of a light colour, and all represent the ascetic, in his sitting posture, wrapped in profound meditation, indifferent to all external phenomena—calm, serene, and imperturbable. The attendants of the temple were either very ignorant or very unwilling to impart information. No one could tell me whether all the twenty-four Jinas had a place in the shrines. One image of perfectly black marble was described to me as that of Pārs′vanāth.
The other temples were not very remarkable, except as affording good illustrations of "foot-worship." In one shrine I saw 1880 footprints of Nemi-nāth's disciples. In another, 1452 footsteps of the disciples of Rishabha. They were covered with offerings of grain and money. All the names of these holy disciples are given in the Jaina sacred works, and it may be remarked that the disciples of Jinas, however celebrated, are never represented by images. That privilege is reserved for the twenty-four supreme Jinas themselves. I noticed that many Hindū idols were placed outside the shrines.
Certainly Jainism, when regarded from the stand-point of a Christian observer, is the coldest of all religions, if, indeed, it deserves to be called a religion at all. Yet the number of temples in certain centres of Jainism far exceeds the number of churches and chapels in the most religious Christian districts. Every Jaina who lays claim to an excess of piety or zeal builds a temple of his own. It never enters into his head to repair the temples of other religious people. At Pālitāna, in Kāthiāwār, there is a whole city of Jaina temples, some new, others decaying, and others quite dilapidated. It is by no means necessary or usual that every temple should possess either priests or worshippers. I can certify that I saw fewer worshippers even in the most celebrated Jaina temples than in any of the Buddhist temples at Columbo or Kandy. Those who came contented themselves with bowing downbefore the idols, and placing flowers or grains of rice and corn on the footprints of the saints.
The Yatis have a kind of liturgy, partly in Sanskrit, partly in the Jaina form of Māgadhī Prākrit, partly in a kind of archaic Gujarātī. No real prayers are offered, but stories of the twenty-four Jinas and their disciples are recited, with singing and an accompaniment of noisy instrumental music and beating of cymbals. Religious festivals and processions are also common. I witnessed one in the town of Kaira, on the anniversary of the death of a celebrated Yati. An immense multitude of men and women paraded the streets, preceded by a very demonstrative band of musicians. In the centre was an apparently empty palanquin, borne by six men. It contained the supposed footprints of the deceased Yati in whose honour the festival was held.
A few short extracts from the Kalpa-sūtra (Stevenson, p. 103) will give some idea of the rules of discipline by which the lives of the Yatis are required to be regulated, as follow:—
"Self-restraint is to be exercised by each man individually. Self-control is the chief of all religious exercises. If a quarrel arise, mutual forgiveness is to be asked. Three daily cleansings are enjoined, morning, mid-day, and evening. A period of rest and fasting is to be observed yearly in the four months of the rainy season. During this period, male and female ascetics should by no means partake of rice, milk, curds, fresh butter, melted butter, oil, sugar, honey, spirits, and flesh. They must never use any angry or provoking language, on pain of being expelled from the community. Ascetics must carefully avoid contact with minute insects, small animals, small seeds, small flowers, small vegetables, &c. No ascetic must do anything whatever, or go out for any purpose whatever, without first asking permission of the Superior of the Convent. The head must be shaved, or the hair constantly clipped. No ascetic must wear hair longer than that which covers a cow."
"Self-restraint is to be exercised by each man individually. Self-control is the chief of all religious exercises. If a quarrel arise, mutual forgiveness is to be asked. Three daily cleansings are enjoined, morning, mid-day, and evening. A period of rest and fasting is to be observed yearly in the four months of the rainy season. During this period, male and female ascetics should by no means partake of rice, milk, curds, fresh butter, melted butter, oil, sugar, honey, spirits, and flesh. They must never use any angry or provoking language, on pain of being expelled from the community. Ascetics must carefully avoid contact with minute insects, small animals, small seeds, small flowers, small vegetables, &c. No ascetic must do anything whatever, or go out for any purpose whatever, without first asking permission of the Superior of the Convent. The head must be shaved, or the hair constantly clipped. No ascetic must wear hair longer than that which covers a cow."
With regard to the last injunction, it may be mentioned that the ceremony of initiation (dīkshā) usually takes place at the age of twelve or thirteen, and that part of the rite once consisted in forcibly pulling out every hair of the head (kes′a-lunchana). In the present day ashes are applied, and a few hairs torn out by the roots before the scissors are used.
It remains to state that the Jainas of the present period are leaning more and more towards Hindū ideas and practices. They have their purificatory rites (sanskāras), and a modified caste system. Not unfrequently Brāhman priests are invited to take part in their marriage ceremonies. Indeed, it is by no means uncommon for intermarriages to take place between lay Jainas (s′rāvakas) and lay Vaishnavas, especially in cases when both belong to the Baniya or merchant caste.
In short, Jainism, like Buddhism, is gradually drifting into the current of Hindūism which everywhere surrounds it, and, like every other offshoot from that system, is destined in the end to be reabsorbed into its source.
I must reserve the subject of the Indo-Zoroastrian creed, and modern Pārsī religious usages, for treatment in my next paper.
Monier Williams.
1If an orthodox Brāhman is asked to describe his religion, he calls it Ārya-dharma, that is, the system of doctrines and duties held and practised by the Āryas. He never thinks of calling it by the name of any special founder or leader. Be it noted, however, that Dharma implies more than a mere religious creed. It is a far more comprehensive term than our word "religion."
2In many images of the Buddha he is represented with the sacred thread over the left shoulder and under the right arm, according to orthodox Brāhmanical usage.
3Since the Buddha became absolutely extinct, and since his system recognised no Supreme Soul of the Universe, there remained nothing for his followers to venerate except his memory. The mass of his converts, however, did not long rest satisfied with enshrining him in their minds. First they made pilgrimages to the Bodhi-tree, or "Tree of Knowledge," at Gayā, under which their great teacher obtained supreme wisdom. There they erected tumuli, or graves (variously called dagobas, chaityas, and stūpas), over his relics, and worshipped, these. Then adoration was paid to his foot-prints, and to the wheel or symbol of the Buddhist law. Finally, images of his person in different attitudes (to be described subsequently) were multiplied everywhere. Temples, at first, were unknown. There were rooms, or places of meeting, for Buddhist congregations to hear preaching; but it was not till a later period that these were used to enshrine images and relics. A vast period of development separates the original Sangha-griha from such a temple as that erected over the eye-tooth of Buddha, at Kandy, in Ceylon, which is a costly edifice, containing images and a library, as well as the far-famed relic shrine behind thick iron bars.
4The expression, Jainism, corresponds to Vaishnavism and S′aivism just as the term Jaina does to Vaishnava or S′aiva. Of course consistency would require the substitution of Bauddhism and Bauddha for Buddhism and Buddhist, but I fear the latter expressions are too firmly established to admit of alteration.
5There is one place in India where the growth of Vaishnavism out of Buddhism, and their near relationship, are conspicuously demonstrated. I mean Buddha-gayā, with the neighbouring Vishnu temple of the city of Gayā.
6In the Caves of Ellora, Brāhmanism, Buddhism, and Jainism, may be seen in juxtaposition, proving that at one period, at least, they existed together, and were mutually tolerant of each other.
7Their names at full are:—1. Rishabha; 2. Ajita; 3. Sambhava; 4. Abhinandana; 5. Sumati; 6. Padma-prabha; 7. Supārs′va; 8. Chandra-prabha; 9. Pushpa-danta; 10. S′ītala; 11. S′reyas; 12. Vāsupūjya; 13. Vimala; 14. Ananta; 15. Dharma; 16. S′ānti; 17. Kunthu; 18. Ara; 19. Malli; 20. Suivrata; 21. Nimi; 22. Nemi; 23. Pārs′vanātha; 24. Mahāvīra, or Vardhamāna. The first of these lived 8,400,000 years, and attained a stature equal to 500 bows' length. The age and stature of the second was something less. The twenty-third lived a hundred years, and was little taller than an ordinary man. The twenty-fourth lived only forty years, and was formed like a man of the present day. The Buddhists hold that their Buddha Gautama was much above the usual height.
8When Buddhism merged in Vaishnavism, its symbol of a wheel (chakra) was adopted by the worshippers of Vishnu.
9The word Tīrtha may mean a sacred ford or crossing-place on the bank of a river, or it may mean a holy man or teacher.
10This is by some interpreted to mean—Reverence to the creative energy inherent in the universe.
11The actual colour of an ascetic's dress is a kind of yellowish-pink, or salmon colour. Pure white is not much used by the Hindūs, except as a mark of mourning, when it takes the place of black with us.
12There is also a very low, insignificant, and intensely atheistical sect of Jainas called Dhundhias. They are much despised by the Hindūs, and even by the more orthodox Jainas.
13This term, as well as Upāsaka, is also used to designate the Buddhist laity.
14From the Sanskrit root,yam, to restrain. The Buddhists call their monks S′ramanas; from the rootS′ram, "men who work hard at austerities," or Bhikshus, "mendicant friars." Their laymen are S′rāvakas, like the Jaina laymen, but are also called Upāsakas.
15Also written Apās′raya.
16When so attired they may be called Pītāmbaras, or Kashāyāmbaras, though they belong to the S′vetāmbara, or white-clothed party.
17Dr. Stevenson conjectures that As′oka's famous edicts were similar proclamations, embodying all the commands and prohibitions of Buddhism and Jainism, engraved on stone to secure their permanence.
18It is doubtless intended as a Jaina satire on the worship of deceased parents and ancestors enjoined by the Brāhmanical system, and commonly practised by true Hindūs.
19The idea of encircling the heads of saints with a disc of light probably existed in India long before Christianity.
20Buddhists believe that the stature of the Buddha far exceeded that of ordinary men. Muslims have similar legends about the stature of Moses.
21There is a legend that the Buddha taught first in a deer-park near Benares.
AWRITERin the last number of thisReview, when giving a portraiture of Mr. Gladstone, pointed out that that right honourable gentleman was a bundle of persons rather than one. It will not, I hope, be thought a very gross plagiarism if I say that Lord Beaconsfield's fame may be divided into four or five distinct reputations, any one of which, in the case of a smaller man, would be thought enough for enduring celebrity. If Mr. Disraeli had never succeeded in making his way into Parliament, he would still, without needing to add another volume to the books he has written, have had to be taken account of as one of our foremost men of letters. Supposing that, having entered the House of Commons, he had not attained office, he would yet have always been remembered as the keenest Parliamentary debater of his time. If his public life had ended in 1852—that is, more than a quarter of a century ago—without his having become a Minister, he would have stood recorded as the most skilful leader of an Opposition which our history has known. Had he never passed a measure through Parliament, he must have been referred to by all political thinkers as a strikingly original critic of our Constitution. Such trifles as that, being born in the days of dandyism, he ranked among the leaders of fashion directly after he was out of his teens, and that he has been a leading social wit his whole life through, may be thrown in without counting. But add the above items together, and fill in the necessary details, and what a startling result we have!
It is very obvious that I cannot here trace Lord Beaconsfield's career in detail. The chronicle is much too rich for that. The better plan will be to make the subject group itself around three or four chief topics—say these: His public consistency; his personalrelations with Peel and other leaders; his political and social views regarded as a system; and his recent foreign policy.
A single paragraph may, however, be interposed, just to bring the principal dates together in a way of prospective summary. Within four years' time from his entering the House of Commons, which, after vain attempts at High Wycombe, Marylebone, and Taunton, he did in 1837 for the borough of Maidstone, Mr. Disraeli was at the head of a party—"The New England Party." The group, if not very numerous, drew as much public attention as if it had been of any size we like to name. Lord John Manners and Mr. G. S. Smythe had the generosity of heart and the keenness of insight to be the first won over by him, and that against the prejudices of their families. Who has not heard of their courageous pilgrimage to the Manchester Athenæum to explain to Cottonopolis how they proposed to re-make the nation? Then came the "Young England" novels, with which all Europe was shortly ringing—"Coningsby" in 1844, "Sybil" in 1845, "Tancred" in 1847. In the meantime Mr. Disraeli had associated himself heart and soul with Lord George Bentinck, attacked Peel, and done far more than any other in reorganizing the shattered Conservative party within the House as well as outside it. By the last-named year, too, Mr. Disraeli had, after a voluntary exchanging of Maidstone for Shrewsbury, become member for Buckinghamshire, a seat which he was to keep so long as he remained in the House of Commons. Suddenly Lord George Bentinck died (much too early for his country), and very soon after that event, owing to the generous standing aside of Lord Granby and Mr. Herries, Mr. Disraeli, within a dozen years of his first entry into Parliament, stood forth as the recognized leader of the Conservatives. The publication of the famous Biography of Lord George Bentinck was at once his noble tribute to the memory of his friend and a valuable help to the party. Five years later, when Lord Russell fell and the first Derby Administration was formed, Mr. Disraeli—never having held an inferior post—became Chancellor of the Exchequer. Shortly followed Lord Palmerston's triumphant reign, to be succeeded, after a further resignation of Lord Russell, by the second Derby Ministry, in which Mr. Disraeli, once more Chancellor of the Exchequer, found time, in addition to his Budget-making, to dish the Whigs by a final Reform Bill. By-and-by the nation lost the Earl of Derby, and the last promotion of official dignity fell naturally to Mr. Disraeli, who became Prime Minister of England. Mr. Gladstone succeeded in preventing the Cabinet from having a very long life, and Mr. Disraeli kept mental self-composure enough, after losing office, to sit down and write "Lothair." By-and-by his political turn again came: 1874 saw him Premier for the second time, and this present year of grace still beholds him in the post, only in the Upper House, instead of the Lower, as Lord Beaconsfield, and with a Parliamentary majority scarcely diminished by five years of an imperial rule which brings back memories of England's most majesticdays. He has visited Berlin, and more than held his own in a Council of the greatest modern diplomatists; has received a welcome back in London city such as no living Minister can boast; and has had the high honour of entertaining his Queen as a guest under his own roof.
Now I may go back to the first of the texts I have chosen.
It is certain that Lord Beaconsfield has always most tenaciously insisted that he has from first to last been politically consistent. His opponents, for very good reasons of their own, have unceasingly affirmed that this assertion is his chiefest, in fact his culminating audacity. But all the facts favour Lord Beaconsfield's view. In the first place, he has never held office but on one side, and he is the only Prime Minister during the last half century who could plead that circumstance. Earl Russell could not say it; certainly Lord Palmerston could not; it is quite out of Mr. Gladstone's power to urge it; even the late Earl of Derby could not make the claim. Next, it is now about thirty-two years since Mr. Disraeli was formally recognized as the leader of the Tory party, and he is still at the head of them, without their confidence having been for a moment shaken or withdrawn. Men, in fact, have been born and have grown up to middle life with Mr. Disraeli all the time remaining at the head of the Conservatives. His inconsistency during at least this somewhat lengthened period must have been of a strange kind, since it has always coincided with the wishes and the interests of his party, for he has never split them, and he has thrice led them into power, But we may go ten years further back than the dates we have named. From first to last, he never sat in Parliament but as an avowedly Tory member for a Tory constituency; during nearly thirty years he sat for one and the same county. If you sift what his enemies, have to say, you will find that it refers to something which took place about forty-five years ago, and is to the effect that he was for five minutes a member of the Westminster Reform Club, and was willing in his first candidatures to accept the assistance of Mr. Hume or of any other of the Radicals. Lord Beaconsfield has the plainest and, as I think, the most sufficient explanation to give of it all.
He says that he came forward at High Wycombe and afterwards offered himself to Marylebone as an opponent of the Whigs, determining to do all he could to bring the Tories into better accord with the masses of the people by re-establishing the natural social bonds between the latter and the aristocracy. Certainly, this is exactly what he has done; it is what he openly said that he aimed at doing from the very beginning. Moreover, the Tories so understood it from the first moment. They gave him their support at High Wycombe before he went to Taunton, and political support cannot be kept very secret. His name was a popular toast at agricultural banquets, and he was sure of a welcome at any muster of the Conservatives. Supposing that the Radicals had not had penetration enough to comprehend the position he took up, who would havebeen to blame for that? But the fact is that it has suited them to pretend in this case to be more stupid than they were. No Radical constituency ever elected Mr. Disraeli. The newspapers of the party never spoke of him as one of their sort; and Messrs. Hume and O'Connell were in a great hurry to withdraw their letters of recommendation, which had reached the candidate unsought. It is not denied by Lord Beaconsfield's most rabid defamer that he presented himself as an Anti-Whig, and it is admitted that long before he was in the House he was a supporter in public of Lord Chandos, and a eulogist of Sir Robert Peel. In his address to the Marylebone electors he described himself as an Independent. But it is really hardly worth while to discuss Mr. Disraeli's politics on this narrow basis.
The case may be put into a nutshell thus: if he had postponed seeking a seat till he went to Taunton, which was in 1835—that is to say forty-four years ago—no one would have been able to say, even in a way of cavil, that he had been ever any other than a most openly understood Tory. It is true that the Radicals would still have been able to complain that he had been bold enough to pass a Reform Bill giving household suffrage in the towns, and so spoiled once for all their party tactics. But that is an allegation of inconsistency which his Conservative supporters whom it has placed in office need not be very anxious to defend him against. The other side had made the question of Reform cease to be one of fair politics; Parliament after Parliament they were trading upon it in the most huckstering spirit. Mr. Disraeli's own first narrower proposals were scoffed at by them. The Bill that was finally passed was avowedly a piece of party tactic, and admirably it answered its end. Of course, since it succeeded so well, Lord Beaconsfield's rivals will never forgive him for it.
However, a more rational use of my space will be to ask at what stage of his career Mr. Disraeli developed the leading political principles which came to be recognized as characteristically his? That is the only mode in which it is worth while to discuss a man's consistency. Lord Beaconsfield has himself done it all in the preface to "Lothair," but I may recall a few details. In the very first election address he ever issued, he styled the Whigs "a rapacious, tyrannical, and incapable faction." That may be taken, one would suppose, as pretty clearly marking his point of political departure. At his second candidature for Wycombe, he quoted Bolingbroke and Windham as his models; and it was as far back as 1835, in his "Vindication of the English Constitution," that he first applied the term "Venetian" to our Constitution, as the Whigs had transformed it. The very peculiarities of theoretical opinion which are most individually his, can be traced back into what in respect of a living man's career might almost be termed antiquity—it is something like two-thirds of half a century ago since he first spoke of the "Asian Mystery." Nobody's sayings liveas Mr. Disraeli's have done. The truth is, that so far from his political system having been hatched piecemeal in a way of after-thought to serve exigencies of personal ambition, he started with it ready made. His critics themselves unknowingly admit this in one part of their clumsy strictures, since they can find events so very recent as his naming of the Queen Empress of India, and his appropriation of Cyprus, sketched in his early novels. But let me take the very latest arraignment to which he has been summoned to plead guilty—that of having invented "Imperialism" just to bolster himself in office. As far back as 1849, which now is exactly thirty years ago, in one of his greatest speeches after having fairly settled down as the leader of his party, he used these words:—"I would sooner my tongue should palsy than counsel the people of England to lower their tone. I would sooner leave this House for ever than I would say to the nation that it has overrated its position.... I believe in the people of England and in their destiny." In his last Premiership he has simply put those thirty-year-old utterances into practice. If he had not done all he has done, he would have been false to the heroic spirit of that far-back hour. On the hustings at Maidstone Mr. Disraeli said, "If there is one thing on which I pique myself, it is my consistency." Lord Beaconsfield in advancing age may repeat the statement without varying it a syllable, though more than forty years have elapsed between the times.
The Peel-Disraeli episode has been for a long time now the chief standard illustration of the political casuistry of our modern Parliamentary history. Mr. Disraeli, those opposed to him will have it, acted most cruelly in that matter. It is rather a curious thing for a young member of Parliament to succeed in being cruel to the most powerful Minister the House of Commons had seen for more than a generation. If a giant is overthrown it must be rather the fault of the colossus somehow, unless, that is, it be a bigger giant who attacks him; and at that time of day, though Mr. Disraeli was growing fast, he really was not yet of the same towering height as Peel. How was it, then, that he succeeded in toppling over the great Minister? Let me first of all say that the truth seems to be that Sir Robert Peel's unlooked-for tragic death has given to his memory a pathetic interest which has caused an unfair heightening of emotion in the case. Neither all England, nor even the bulk of Parliament, was in tears, busy with pocket-handkerchiefs, during the delivery of those famous philippics. If pocket-handkerchiefs were used it was to wipe away drops caused by laughter, for everybody was roaring from moment to moment as each stroke told. Peel had taken up a position in reference to his old supporters which was certain to entail attack; the only thing special that Mr. Disraeli contributed to the assault was the splendour of the wit which barbed it. Everything that he said of Peel, allowing fairly for controversial exigencies, was strictly true. Nobody wishes to revivethose necessarily hard sayings now, but it must be insisted upon for a second, in passing, that Peel had treated his party as no Minister before him had ever done. It was the exactest verity, as well as the keenest sarcasm, when Mr. Disraeli charged him with having tried to steer his party right into the harbour of the enemy. Mr. Disraeli was the man to feel this most of any, for it is one of his leading principles that as this nation now exists party in our constitution is an apparatus absolutely necessary to be preserved. He has for a third of a century since then himself unfailingly worked by that rule. But I scarcely need urge this part of the matter further here, as another word bearing upon it will come later. If Peel had lived on, he and his attacker would before the end have come to terms amicably enough, as Mr. Disraeli has since done with everybody else whom he has, from obligations of political duty, had publicly to oppose. That is, unless they were stupid enough not to remember his known determination that Parliamentary life should be raised above the level of vestry proceedings, by being dignified by a play of wit; or else were ill-conditioned enough, as some who have held high place have been, not to meet his offered open palm when the weapon was put back into the sheath. Peel himself would have had more sense; so, too, the present bearer of his name has shown himself to have. The rather idle statement that the Disraelian assault was prompted out of spite at not being made an Under-Secretary may at this time of day be, perhaps, passed over. Mr. Disraeli spoke with and voted for Peel long after that supposed neglect, and though it may be said that a spiteful man could nurse his revenge, it is just as true that the most generous could have done nothing more than go on showing respect and giving support just as Mr. Disraeli did. Further, no one was prompter than he was with words of praise so soon as there was opportunity for them. Indeed, the finest eulogy of Peel stands recorded in the printed pages of the person who is charged with pursuing him with unheard-of bitterness. The man who waited for office till the day when he vaulted at once into the Chancellorship of the Exchequer, was scarcely the one to be mightily offended, because, when a first batch of appointments was distributed, an Under-Secretaryship went by him. It was the leadership of his party for wise ends that Mr. Disraeli was looking out for.