BOOK VI.

BOOK VI.BUDDHISTS AND BRAHMANS.

The list of the kings of Magadha, preserved not only among the Brahmans, but from the seventh centuryB.C.downwards among the Buddhists who then came forward to oppose them, allow us to assert with tolerable accuracy that the dynasty of the Pradyotas, which ascended the throne of Magadha in the year 803B.C., was succeeded in 665B.C.by another family, known to the Brahmans as the Çaiçunagas.[384]The first two kings of this house were Kshemadharman and Bhattya (the Kshatraujas of the Brahmans). In 603B.C.Bhattya was succeeded by his son Bimbisara. In the reign of this king, according to the ancient sutras of the Buddhists, justice, morals, and religion were regulated in Magadha and the neighbouring states according to the wishes of the Brahmans. In these narratives we find the rules of the law-book generally recognised and carried out in all essential points, and in some respects they are even transcended. The system of exclusive castes is complete. The stricter marriage law, forbidding union with a woman of another caste, is victorious over themore liberal view that the husband fixed the caste. "Brahmans marry Brahmans only, nobles only nobles; a man takes a wife only from an equal family."[385]Within the castes those of equal position are divided into separate corporations. Among the Vaiçyas and Çudras, merchants, artisans, barbers, form special castes, in which the occupation of the father descends to the son; the son of a merchant is a merchant, and the son of a butcher a butcher.[386]The laws on the order of the castes and forbidden food were strictly observed. The lower and impure castes thoroughly believe in their vocation. The Kshatriya, though sick to death, refuses to take even as a remedy the forbidden onion (p. 169), which the physician hands to him.[387]The Chandalas give notice of their approach that the higher castes may not be rendered impure by contact with them; they eat dog's flesh as the law requires, and carry the dead out beyond the gates of the city.[388]Invested with the holy girdle, the Brahmans, as the law directs (p. 173), bear continually in their hands the staff of bamboo and the pitcher of water for purification. The learned among them are occupied with the study of the Veda; they recite the hymns, instruct pupils, and hold discussions on theology and philosophy. Occasionally the princes take an interest in these learned contests, and cause the disputations to go on at their courts in their presence; one king favours this system, another that; one protects this school, the other a different school. The penitent Brahmans live as anchorites in the forest, in the mountains, on the holy lakes Ravanahadra and Manasa, underKailasa, the lofty peak of the Himalayas. Some live in complete solitude, others dwell in such a manner that a whole circle of settlements lie close together.[389]The neighbours now and then combine for disputation, others give themselves up in deep solitude to meditation and mortification. At that time hundreds of these penitents are said to have lived on the holy lakes, and the severity of their exercises appears already to have exceeded the requirements of the book of the law. Some fast, others sit between four fires, others perpetually hold their hands above their heads, others lie on hot ashes, others on a wooden bed covered with sharp points.[390]Other Brahmans, and it would appear a considerable number, wander as mendicants through the land; others pursue the newly-discovered avocations of astrology and sooth-saying;[391]others avail themselves of the permission of the book of the law to drive the plough, and carry on the business of a merchant.[392]Others think that they will find an easier path to maintenance and money if they present the kings with poems written in their praise, or give their daughters to be received into the harem of princes. Not all Brahmans could read and write: many confoundedOmandBhur.[393]

The life of the opulent classes, had become, it is said, easy and luxurious. In such circles no one went without a servant to carry the parasol and keep off the flies. The physician was sent for in every case of sickness, and poor men entreated him not to order too costly remedies. The lot of the beggar was considered miserable, because he could not have a physicianin sickness, or obtain medicine.[394]Industry and trade flourished in spite of the hindrances thrown in the way by the system of caste, or the taxation, which, as is shown by many indications beside the directions in the book of the law, was severe. That Magadha, even before the sixth century, was the seat of a lively trade, we may conclude from the fact that the merchants are called simply "Magadhas" in the book of the law. Caravans under the guidance of a chief convey the wares from one city to another on camels, elephants, oxen, and asses, or on the shoulders of bearers, till the sea-coast is reached. Stuffs and woven cloths, especially silk of Varanasi, sandal-wood, saffron and camphor, horses from the north, "noble Sindhu horses," are mentioned as the commonest articles of traffic.[395]As the most important the book of the law enumerates precious stones, pearls, corals, iron, woven cloths, perfumes and spices, and advises the man who wishes to amass money quickly to go to sea; "he who will obtain wealth most quickly must not despise the dangers and misery of the great ocean." According to the statements of the sutras the merchants go by hundreds over the sea. The costly sandal-woods of the Malabar coasts are embarked at Çurparaka (which must no doubt be looked for at the mouth of the Krishna); from thence men sailed past Tamraparni (Ceylon) in order to buy precious stones on a distant island.[396]In the larger cities the merchants formed corporations, the chiefs of which treat with the kings in the names of the whole;[397]some especially-favoured merchants obtained the privilege of receiving theirwares free of toll. The great merchants in the cities did not find it necessary to pay at once for the wares which came from a distance. They printed their seal on the bales which they would buy, and paid a small deposit.[398]The members of the family work at their occupation in common; while one brother stays at home and attends to the sale, the others go with the caravans or are at sea.[399]In these circles no one marries till he has amassed a certain sum of money. The profits of the merchants appear to have been easy and large, though their journeys were attended with danger. They were not only threatened with the exactions of tax-gatherers and attacks of robbers, but were exposed to great temptations in the cities. Mistresses could be found there, "whose bodies were soft as the lotus flower, and shone in gay attire." These, no doubt, gave themselves up to the young travellers at no inconsiderable price.[400]

The kings of Magadha resided at Rajagriha,i. e.the king's house, a city which lay to the south of the Ganges and the east of the Çona. The sutras mention Prasenajit, king of the Koçalas, who, as already remarked, lay on the Sarayu, and Vatsa, the son of Çatanika, king of the Bharatas, as contemporaries of Bimbisara, king of Magadha, and his son Ajataçatru. Hence the reigns of Prasenajit and Vatsa may be placed in the first half and about the middle of the sixth centuryB.C.Both princes are mentioned in the tradition of the Brahmans. In the Vishnu-Purana, Prasenajit is the twenty-third ruler of the Koçalas after the great war. Vatsa is the twenty-fifth successor of Parikshit, who is said to have ascended the throne of Hastinapura after the victory and abdication of thesons of Pandu.[401]The kings of the Koçalas had built a new city, Çravasti, to the north of their ancientcapital Ayodhya; the kings of the Bharatas resided at Kauçambi on the Ganges. To the north of thekingdom of Magadha, on the other bank of the Ganges, lay the commonwealth of the Vrijis on the Gogari, and the kingdom of Mithila; to the east on both shores of the Ganges were the Angas, whose capital appears to have been Champa (in the neighbourhood of the modern Bhagalpur); to the west of Magadha on the Ganges were the Kaçis, whose capital was Varanasi (Benares). The colonies of the Arians had advanced and their territory had been extended to the south both on the east and west. This is not merely proved by the mention of Çurparaka, for the sutras of the Buddhists tell us of a great Arian kingdom on the northern spur of the Vindhyas, the metropolis of which was Ujjayini (Ozene in western writers) on the Sipra, and adjoining this on the coast was the kingdom of Surashtra (Guzerat).[402]

The life of the kings on the Ganges is described by our authorities in glowing colours. Their palaces are spacious, provided with gardens and terraces for promenading. Besides the women and servants, the bodyguard and the executioners clothed in blue are domiciled in the royal citadels. The princes eat off silver and gold, and are clothed in silk of Varanasi. Friendly princes make handsome presents to each other,e. g.suits of armour adorned with precious stones.[403]Their edicts and commands are composed in writing and stamped with the seal of ivory.[404]The labours of government are relieved by the pleasures of the chase. In sickness the princes are served with the most select remedies. When Bimbisari's son and successor fell down one day in a swoon, he was placed in sixtubs full of fresh butter, and afterwards in a seventh filled with the most costly sandal-wood.[405]The harem of the king was numerous, and the women had great influence; the children which they bore were suckled by nurses, of whom one child had at times eight.[406]Any one who ventured to cast a look upon one of the wives of the king forfeited his life. When one of the wives of Prasenajit, king of the Koçalas, was walking in the evening on the terrace of the palace she saw the handsome brother of the king, and threw him a bouquet; when this came to the ears of Prasenajit, he caused the feet and hands of his brother to be cut off.[407]The same cruel and barbarous character marks all the punishments inflicted by the king. On the order of a king whose mildness and justice are commended, all the inhabitants of the city are said to have been put to death on account of an error committed by one of them.[408]If any one had to make a communication to the king, or lay any matter before him, he first besought that he might not be punished for his words. No one approached the king without a present; least of all merchants. Happy events were announced by princes to their cities by the sound of bells. Stones, gravel, and dirt were then removed from the streets, which were sprinkled with sandal-water and strewed with flowers and garlands, and silken stuffs were hung along them. At certain distances jars filled with frankincense were placed; and if a guest of distinction was to be received the ways were cleansed for a considerable space before the gates, smoothed, and perfumed, and furnished with standards, parasols, and resting-places of flowers.[409]

We have already remarked how unfamiliar the abstract god which the Brahmans had placed at the head of their theory remained to the people, both in his impersonal and personal form. They had been more deeply influenced by the degradation of the old gods, introduced by the Brahmans in consequence of their religious system (p. 287). Yet it was not so much these doctrines which caused the old gods to lose their primitive power, and complete charm over the hearts of men, as the fact that the motives which now governed the life of the Aryas were wholly different from those which had filled them in old days on the Indus. Indra, the hurler of the thunder-bolt, had fought with the tribes whose offering of Soma he had drunk. The storm of the elements characteristic of the Panjab was unknown on the Ganges; and in the civilised conditions of a peaceful, obedient, quiet life the old slayer of the demons could no longer excite the lively feelings of the people. The Brahmans might recede ever further from nature; the people, the peasants and herdmen, remained in constant contact with her, and with the phenomena of the sky and the vegetative life of the earth; they felt themselves continually surrounded by the mighty operations of nature. The feeling and faith of the people required a more personal, present, living power, which assured them of help and protection. While the Brahmans wearied themselves with abstractions and philosophic systems, the needs of the multitude, the poetical vein of the Indian nation, its realism as opposed to the spiritualism of the priests and Brahmans, struck out new paths. So it came about that as the supreme deities of the most ancient and the early periods faded away more and more, as Mitra and Varuna, Indra and Ushas passed into the background, forms hitherto little regarded rose up outof the circle of these spirits, which were akin to the present instincts and needs of the nation, the immediate modes of feeling, and in closer relation to them. This movement was not confined to the people; within the circles of the Brahmans, who were not wholly given up to abstractions, the want of a living power, governing the world, could not but be felt.[410]

In the hymns of the Rigveda a god Vishnu is invoked, though but little prominence is given to him. He is called a friend and comrade of Indra; it said of him that he walks over the seven parts of the earth; that he plants his foot in three places. The "far-stepping" Vishnu is invited with Mitra, Varuna, and Aryaman to give salvation. He dwells in the height; his exalted habitation, where honey flows, beams with clear light. He sustains trebly the sky, the earth, and all worlds; he walks with three steps through the wide firmament. He walks through the worlds to secure long life for men. Not even the soaring winged birds could reach up to his third step. He hastens on to ally himself with the beneficent Indra; he favours and protects the Aryas. Fired by hymns of praise Vishnu himself yokes the mighty mares, and dashes into the battle in his youth and strength, accompanied by the Maruts. "Friend Vishnu," said Indra, when planning the death of Vritra, "step out wide; thou heaven, give room, that the thunder-club may descend; let us smite Vritra and set the waters free. O strong god (Indra), in concert with Vishnu thou hast smitten Vritra; thou hast smitten Ahi who held back the waters." "Ye two heroes, who bring to nought the magic powers of thehostile spirits, to you I bring songs of praise and sacrifice. Ye have always conquered, ye have never been overcome. Come ye, Indra and Vishnu, to the draught of Soma, bring treasures with you; may your mares, which overpower the foe, sharing in your victories, bring you hither; may our songs anoint you with the ointment of prayer. Rejoiced by the draught of Soma, take ye your wide steps; make wide the atmosphere and spread out the earth. Grant us rich sustenance in our houses." "No mortal, O Vishnu, knows the uttermost limits of thy greatness; thou hast surrounded the earth on both sides with beams of light. Never does the man repent it, who serves the far-stepping Vishnu with all his heart, and makes the mighty one favourable. Grant us, O swift god, thy favour graciously, which includes all men; thy favouring glance, that abundance, treasures, and horses may be ours. Thrice the swift god stepped through the earth that he might make it to be a dwelling for men."[411]

Hence we must regard Vishnu, whose dwelling is in the height of heaven, as a swift spirit of light. Invoked in the hymns of the Veda beside the Adityas or spirits of light, he is not definitely named as such, though we cannot refuse to him a close connection with the sun when we consider the further development of the conception formed of him. As he supports Indra in the battle against the demons, he must be regarded, like him, as a protector against the evil ones, a giver of water and wealth. His kindly feeling towards men, his beneficent acts are brought into prominence. Hence from the early point of view he was a god bringing blessing and help. The three steps are explained by the Mahabharata as the earth, the air, andthe heavens;[412]other explanations refer them to the light of the sun at morning, noon, and evening. The Brahmanas reckon Vishnu among their twelve Adityas (instead of the seven or eight of the Rigveda), and give a myth of Vishnu. The Aitareya-Brahmana calls him the gate-keeper, but also the highest deity, as Agni is the lowest; the rest of the gods are between them. Leaning on his bow Vishnu stood, as the Çatapatha-Brahmana relates, while the rest of the gods sacrificed to Kurukshetra; the ants ate through the string, the bow sprung back and tore off Vishnu's head, which now flew through heaven and earth. The body was divided by the gods into three parts; Agni took the morning sacrifice, Indra that at mid-day, and all the rest the third sacrifice. But they received no blessing from their headless sacrifice, till the Açvins, who were skilled in the art of healing, put back the head on the sacrifice. Further, by sacrifice and penance Vishnu became the first of the gods; in order to wrest this place from him the other gods caused the ants to eat through the string and then divided Vishnu, the sacrifice, into three parts.[413]Here the gods are found sacrificing a god, but the self-sacrifice of the gods is common in the Brahmanas. Mystical conceptions of this kind naturally remained outside the national religion. The view of the Aitareya-Brahmana is nearer the popular mind—that Vishnu took away from the Asuras the world of which they had possessed themselves, and gave it back to the gods. This idea is carried out in the Epos: Bali, a great Asura, had gained the dominion over the earth, and conquered the gods; in order to help the gods out of their distress Vishnu assumes the form of a dwarf, and entreats Bali to allow him spacefor three steps of his dwarfish feet. Having obtained his request he takes possession of earth, air, and heaven in three great steps, hurls the Asura into hell, and thus, by the liberation of the world and the gods, he became the younger brother of Indra.[414]

This mighty god, the ruler of earth and heaven, this swift, bright, friendly helper of gods and men, was invoked by the nation on the Ganges as their best protecting deity. It was no doubt the helpful nature of Vishnu, the characteristic celebrated in the songs of the Veda and in the legends, which permitted this change. In the plains of the Ganges fruit and increase naturally depended on the period of rain, on the regular rise and overflow of the river, not on violent crises in the sky, or the tempestuous storm in which Indra was still the ruling deity; in this district the blessing of the land, the life-giving, fructifying power of nature, could be ascribed to a deity who worked his beneficial will in a ceaseless persistent course. In the book of the law Vishnu is hardly mentioned; only once, in the addition at the close, is reference made to his swift approach;[415]on the other hand, in the ancient sutras of the Buddhists, Vishnu appears under the names Hari and Janardana as a widely-honoured deity.[416]

Rudra, the god of the storm, is repeatedly invoked in the Rigveda. Derived from the tumult of the tempest, the name signifies "the roarer," "the howler." He is the father of the Maruts, or winds, the god whom no other surpasses in strength, terrible as a wild beast, as the boar of the sky. Red or brown in colour,he wears his hair closely braided (an idea no doubt taken from the clouds gathered together by the storm-wind); the swift strong arrows from his mighty bow force their way from heaven to earth; he is the lord of the heroes, the slayer of men. "Bring to the venerable Rudra the draught of the Soma; I have praised him with the heroes of the sky,"—so we are told in some prayers of the Rigveda. "Submissively we call on the red boar of the sky; be gracious to us, to our children and descendants! Smite neither the great nor the small among us, neither father nor mother, neither our cattle nor our horses. Listen to our prayers, father of the Maruts." "May Rudra's arrow pass by us; may the spear which travels over the earth touch us not. May the weapons which slay men and cows remain far from us! Grant us refuge and protection; take thou our side. Remove from us sickness and want, thou who art easily entreated. Thou bearest in thy hand a thousand remedies; these I desire with the favour of Rudra. Be gracious to the wandering sources of our nourishment; let our cows eat strengthening plants, and drink abundant life-giving water. For our men and women, for our horses, rams, sheep and cows, Rudra secures health and prosperity".[417]It is the wild injurious force of the storm, the force that carries off men and animals, which these prayers would avert, and the beneficial consequences of this storm, the filling of springs and streams, the refreshment of the meadows, the cooling and purification of the air, are the blessings which these prayers would win from the double nature of the easily entreated god. By the remedies which Rudra carries in his hand along with the mighty bow the beneficial consequences of the storm are no doubt to be understood. In the Atharvaveda, Rudra withBhava is invoked under the name of Çarva as a mighty, darkly-glancing archer, with black hair, a thrower of the spear, who dashes on with a thousand eyes, and slays the Andhakas. Here also he is entreated not to be angry, not to smite men nor cattle, to hurl his heavenly weapons against others and not against his suppliant.[418]He is more highly exalted still in the Çatapatha-Brahmana, which unites in him the attributes and functions of various gods, of Vayu, Chandra, Bhava, Parjanya,i. e.the rain-god, and of Agni, represents the gods as afraid of his power, and denotes him by the name Mahadeva (great god). A long and extraordinary prayer which this Brahmana prescribes for appeasing him, ascribes to him the most extensive power: it calls him the inhabitant, the lord of the mountains, forests, and fields, of the wild beasts, of the streets and hosts, who slays from before and from behind, red in colour, with a blue neck. If the anger of the mighty deity is appeased, he brings rain and blessing, and then he is the gracious one, Çiva. The fruitfulness of this deity and the necessity of propitiating him appear to have brought it about that this name, which is found as an epithet of other gods, became his peculiar title. In the old sutras of the Buddhists he is thus called, though he more frequently bears the name Çankara,i. e.bringer of happiness.

We see that the deity whose strong power drove up the rain-clouds to the coast of Surashtra (Guzerat) and the heights of the Himalayas was victorious over the ancient god of tempest. In this god there was a destroying power, but his anger and rage were followed by the fructifying showers of rain, causingvegetation to revive and the springs to flow, cooling the air and refreshing man and beast. So the nation looked up with thankful eyes to the god of storm who had now, in reality, become a god of increase and prosperity, a healer of wounds and sickness, as was already indicated in the poems of the Rigveda. Among his retinue is a being of the name of Nandin, who appears later as a bull, and is without doubt nothing more than an indication of the wild force of the storm, and its fruitful operation.[419]As he is more especially a lord of the mountains, and is said to be throned on Kailasa, and the Ganges flows down over his head, as the Epos represents the heroes as going to the Himalayas to worship Çiva, and the storm rages fiercest in the hills, we may assume that it was the inhabitants of the Western Himalayas who elevated Rudra-Çiva to be their protecting deity, just as Vishnu became the god of the nations on the Ganges.[420]

FOOTNOTES:[384]Cp. p. 76, 145, 321.[385]Burnouf, "Introduction à l'histoire du Bouddhisme," p. 208, 209, 151.[386]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 152.[387]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 150.[388]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 138, 205, 208.[389]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 157, 172. Lassen, "Ind. Alterth." 1, 581-585.[390]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 138, 415.[391]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 141, 149, 343.[392]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 141.[393]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 139, 140, 149.Supra, p. 173.[394]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 236, 420.[395]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 241, 244 ff. "Dhammapadam," translated by A. Weber, 322.[396]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 223, 238.[397]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 247.[398]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 245, 246.[399]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 240.[400]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 146, 187.[401]Above, p. 95. Our chronology for the epochs of Indian history depends essentially on fixing two points. The first is the accession of Chandragupta in Magadha, already mentioned, from which the year 315B.C.is certain (cp.infra); the second point is the year of Buddha's death. The Bhagavata-Purana puts Buddha's death 2000 years after the beginning of the Kaliyuga (supra, p. 77); such a round number and so general a date cannot lay claim to credibility. Besides this we have a number of other Brahmanic statements about the date of Buddha's life, varying more or less, but equally untrustworthy. More weight would naturally be ascribed to the statements of the Buddhists; yet even these differ widely from each other. The Thibetans have fourteen different statements about the year of Buddha's death, which cover the interval from 2422 to 546 or 544B.C.The Chinese Buddhists as a rule assign Buddha's death to the year 950B.C., but Buddhism did not reach the Chinese till after the birth of Christ. The most trustworthy statement seems to be that of the Singhalese. Buddhism reached them soon after the year 250B.C.; from the year 161B.C.their chronology agrees with existing inscriptions: their chronological system and their era is based on the year of Buddha's death, which they place in 543B.C.If this date is compared with the Brahmanic list of kings of Magadha we get the following results: Before Chandragupta the dynasty of the Nandas reigned for 88 years according to the Brahmanic accounts, and 22 according to the Singhalese. On this point I agree with Lassen and Gutschmid in preferring the statement of the Brahmans, because the error of the Singhalese may very easily have arisen from the fact that the reign of 22 years, which they give to the sons of Kalaçoka, was incorrectly repeated for the following dynasty. According to this the first Nanda ascended the throne of Magadha in the year 403 (315+88). From this year the items on the Singhalese list carry us up to the year 665B.C.for the accession of Kshemadharman (Çiçunaga), and the year 603B.C.for the commencement of the reign of Bimbisara (Gutschmid, "Beiträge," s. 79 ff.), who is succeeded by Ajataçatru eight years before Buddha's Nirvana ("Mahavança," 2, 32, p. 10, ed. Turnour), which thus falls in the year 543B.C.If we keep to the Singhalese date for the Nanda dynasty, we arrive at the year 477B.C.for Buddha's death. Bimbisara ascended the throne 198 years according to the Matsya-Purana, and 193 years according to the Vayu-Purana, before the first Nanda. If the year 403B.C.marks the accession of the Nandas, Bimbisara according to the Matsya-Purana began to reign in 601B.C., and according to the Vayu-Purana in 590B.C.Between Bimbisara's accession in 603B.C.and the end of Açoka of Magadha there intervene, according to the statements of the Buddhists, 375 years. If with this we compare the dates of the reigns in the list of kings in the Vayu-Purana from Bimbisara to Açoka, we get 378 years from the first year of Bimbisara to the last year of Açoka. There is also another fact which agrees with the era 543B.C.According to the statements of the Singhalese the second synod of the Buddhists was held 100 or 110 years after Buddha's death, in the reign of Kalaçoka,i. e.in 443 or 433B.C.("Mahavança," ed. Turnour, p. 15). Of these two statements it is obvious that the more definite, 110 years, is more deserving of credit. According to the detailed statements of the Singhalese for the time of the separate reigns, Kalaçoka's reign begins 90 years after Buddha's death,i. e.453; he reigns 28 years according to the Singhalese,i. e.if we reckon up the single items from Chandragupta (the Nandas 80, and Kalaçoka's sons 22 years) from 453 to 425B.C.In this way the era of the Singhalese and the year of Buddha's death are completely justified. Still the year is not wholly beyond a doubt. According to the statement of the native Singhalese, Chandragupta ascended the throne 162 years (and the various items agree with this total) after Buddha's death,i. e.162 years after the year 543B.C., and therefore in the year 381B.C., but we know that his accession took place in 315B.C.Here we find an error of 66 years, which however we have already removed by adopting the Brahmanic statement of 88 years for the dynasty of the Nandas instead of the 22 years of the Singhalese. Further, it does not agree with the era of 543B.C., when we are told by the Singhalese that the third Buddhist synod was held 118 years after the second,i. e.228 years after Buddha's death. We know from inscriptions that this synod met in the seventeenth year of Açoka, Chandragupta's second successor. Açoka reigned from 265 to 228, or from 263 to 226B.C.: his seventeenth year reckoned from 265 would be 249B.C.; if we add to this 228 years we get 477B.C.for the year of Buddha's death; thus we have here again the same error of 66 years. Lastly, it does not agree with the era of 543B.C.when we are told that the fourth Buddhist synod was held 400 years after the death of Buddha, under Kanishka, king of Cashmere. Kanishka is a contemporary of Augustus and Antonius (Lassen, "Ind. Alterth." 2, 412, 413); and according to this statement, therefore, Buddha would have died about the year 400B.C.As the number of 400 years given for the fourth synod is nevertheless designedly a round number, little weight is to be placed upon it, and the year 543 can be kept as the year of Buddha's death. Before the dynasty of the Nandas in Magadha (403-315B.C.) the throne was occupied by the Kshatrabandhus or Çaiçunagas for 262 years (665-403B.C.); before these came the Pradyotas with 138 years (803-665B.C.), who were again preceded (as is shown above, p. 77) by the Barhadrathas with 615 years,i. e.from 1418 to 803B.C.(Cf. Gutschmid in "Beiträge zur Geschichte des alten Orients," s. 76, 87, and in "Zeitschrift d. D. M. G." 18, 372 ff.)[402]As the Arian colonists go from Surashtra to Ceylon about the year 500B.C., this kingdom must have been in existence in the sixth centuryB.C.Burnouf, "Introduction," p. 166 ff.[403]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 427.[404]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 407.[405]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 245.[406]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 237, 432.[407]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 146, 514.[408]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 423.[409]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 175, 261, 380.[410]If I ascribe the rise of Vishnu and Çiva primarily to the people, this is done because the need pointed out must have been felt most deeply by them; two rival deities would never have been elevated to supreme positions if the movement had not begun from beneath, and the life in two different districts had not formed the starting-point.[411]Muir, "Sanskrit Texts," 4, 67 ff.[412]"Vanaparvan," 484 ff. in Muir,loc. cit.4, 136.[413]Muir,loc. cit.4, 124 ff., 127.[414]Muir,loc. cit.4, 131, 252 ff. The epithet of Vishnu, Upendra,i. e.Beside-Indra, points to this position.[415]Manu, 12, 121.[416]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 137; A. Weber, "Ind. Studien," 2, 20; Lassen, "Ind. Alterth." 12, 918.[417]Muir,loc. cit.4, 300-320.[418]Muir,loc. cit.4, 184, 230, 269. Lassen,loc. cit.12, 922. On the seats of the worship of Çiva on the coasts of the Deccan in the Mahabharata, cp. Muir,loc. cit.44, 28, 285.[419]Nandinmeans having delight, delighted.[420]In the book of the law Vishnu is mentioned once only (12, 121), and Çiva not at all. The old sutras of the Buddhists, on the other hand, as has been stated, mentioned Çiva frequently under the name Çankara, and Vishnu under the names Hari and Janardana. Lassen has rightly perceived that the Narayana of the ancient sutras and of the law-book was not yet Vishnu, but Brahman, and Narayana was not transferred to Vishnu till later ("Alterth." 12, 918; 22, 464). The Mahavança (7, 47, ed. Turnour) mentions Vishnu as the tutelary deity of the earliest settlers in Ceylon. This settlement took place about 500B.C., while Çiva appears as the tutelary deity of the somewhat more ancient Mathura in the south. The rise of the worship of Çiva and Vishnu according to these indications must be placed between 600 and 500B.C.Panini is acquainted with Avataras of Vishnu (Lassen,loc. cit.12, 921); in the accounts of the Greeks Krishna is already identified with Vishnu, and is widely worshipped both in the valley of the Ganges and in the extreme south of India, while Çiva is worshipped in the mountains. The development of this worship must therefore have taken place between 500 and 300B.C., and no doubt chiefly in the second part of this period.

[384]Cp. p. 76, 145, 321.

[385]Burnouf, "Introduction à l'histoire du Bouddhisme," p. 208, 209, 151.

[386]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 152.

[387]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 150.

[388]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 138, 205, 208.

[389]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 157, 172. Lassen, "Ind. Alterth." 1, 581-585.

[390]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 138, 415.

[391]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 141, 149, 343.

[392]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 141.

[393]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 139, 140, 149.Supra, p. 173.

[394]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 236, 420.

[395]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 241, 244 ff. "Dhammapadam," translated by A. Weber, 322.

[396]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 223, 238.

[397]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 247.

[398]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 245, 246.

[399]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 240.

[400]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 146, 187.

[401]Above, p. 95. Our chronology for the epochs of Indian history depends essentially on fixing two points. The first is the accession of Chandragupta in Magadha, already mentioned, from which the year 315B.C.is certain (cp.infra); the second point is the year of Buddha's death. The Bhagavata-Purana puts Buddha's death 2000 years after the beginning of the Kaliyuga (supra, p. 77); such a round number and so general a date cannot lay claim to credibility. Besides this we have a number of other Brahmanic statements about the date of Buddha's life, varying more or less, but equally untrustworthy. More weight would naturally be ascribed to the statements of the Buddhists; yet even these differ widely from each other. The Thibetans have fourteen different statements about the year of Buddha's death, which cover the interval from 2422 to 546 or 544B.C.The Chinese Buddhists as a rule assign Buddha's death to the year 950B.C., but Buddhism did not reach the Chinese till after the birth of Christ. The most trustworthy statement seems to be that of the Singhalese. Buddhism reached them soon after the year 250B.C.; from the year 161B.C.their chronology agrees with existing inscriptions: their chronological system and their era is based on the year of Buddha's death, which they place in 543B.C.If this date is compared with the Brahmanic list of kings of Magadha we get the following results: Before Chandragupta the dynasty of the Nandas reigned for 88 years according to the Brahmanic accounts, and 22 according to the Singhalese. On this point I agree with Lassen and Gutschmid in preferring the statement of the Brahmans, because the error of the Singhalese may very easily have arisen from the fact that the reign of 22 years, which they give to the sons of Kalaçoka, was incorrectly repeated for the following dynasty. According to this the first Nanda ascended the throne of Magadha in the year 403 (315+88). From this year the items on the Singhalese list carry us up to the year 665B.C.for the accession of Kshemadharman (Çiçunaga), and the year 603B.C.for the commencement of the reign of Bimbisara (Gutschmid, "Beiträge," s. 79 ff.), who is succeeded by Ajataçatru eight years before Buddha's Nirvana ("Mahavança," 2, 32, p. 10, ed. Turnour), which thus falls in the year 543B.C.If we keep to the Singhalese date for the Nanda dynasty, we arrive at the year 477B.C.for Buddha's death. Bimbisara ascended the throne 198 years according to the Matsya-Purana, and 193 years according to the Vayu-Purana, before the first Nanda. If the year 403B.C.marks the accession of the Nandas, Bimbisara according to the Matsya-Purana began to reign in 601B.C., and according to the Vayu-Purana in 590B.C.Between Bimbisara's accession in 603B.C.and the end of Açoka of Magadha there intervene, according to the statements of the Buddhists, 375 years. If with this we compare the dates of the reigns in the list of kings in the Vayu-Purana from Bimbisara to Açoka, we get 378 years from the first year of Bimbisara to the last year of Açoka. There is also another fact which agrees with the era 543B.C.According to the statements of the Singhalese the second synod of the Buddhists was held 100 or 110 years after Buddha's death, in the reign of Kalaçoka,i. e.in 443 or 433B.C.("Mahavança," ed. Turnour, p. 15). Of these two statements it is obvious that the more definite, 110 years, is more deserving of credit. According to the detailed statements of the Singhalese for the time of the separate reigns, Kalaçoka's reign begins 90 years after Buddha's death,i. e.453; he reigns 28 years according to the Singhalese,i. e.if we reckon up the single items from Chandragupta (the Nandas 80, and Kalaçoka's sons 22 years) from 453 to 425B.C.In this way the era of the Singhalese and the year of Buddha's death are completely justified. Still the year is not wholly beyond a doubt. According to the statement of the native Singhalese, Chandragupta ascended the throne 162 years (and the various items agree with this total) after Buddha's death,i. e.162 years after the year 543B.C., and therefore in the year 381B.C., but we know that his accession took place in 315B.C.Here we find an error of 66 years, which however we have already removed by adopting the Brahmanic statement of 88 years for the dynasty of the Nandas instead of the 22 years of the Singhalese. Further, it does not agree with the era of 543B.C., when we are told by the Singhalese that the third Buddhist synod was held 118 years after the second,i. e.228 years after Buddha's death. We know from inscriptions that this synod met in the seventeenth year of Açoka, Chandragupta's second successor. Açoka reigned from 265 to 228, or from 263 to 226B.C.: his seventeenth year reckoned from 265 would be 249B.C.; if we add to this 228 years we get 477B.C.for the year of Buddha's death; thus we have here again the same error of 66 years. Lastly, it does not agree with the era of 543B.C.when we are told that the fourth Buddhist synod was held 400 years after the death of Buddha, under Kanishka, king of Cashmere. Kanishka is a contemporary of Augustus and Antonius (Lassen, "Ind. Alterth." 2, 412, 413); and according to this statement, therefore, Buddha would have died about the year 400B.C.As the number of 400 years given for the fourth synod is nevertheless designedly a round number, little weight is to be placed upon it, and the year 543 can be kept as the year of Buddha's death. Before the dynasty of the Nandas in Magadha (403-315B.C.) the throne was occupied by the Kshatrabandhus or Çaiçunagas for 262 years (665-403B.C.); before these came the Pradyotas with 138 years (803-665B.C.), who were again preceded (as is shown above, p. 77) by the Barhadrathas with 615 years,i. e.from 1418 to 803B.C.(Cf. Gutschmid in "Beiträge zur Geschichte des alten Orients," s. 76, 87, and in "Zeitschrift d. D. M. G." 18, 372 ff.)

[402]As the Arian colonists go from Surashtra to Ceylon about the year 500B.C., this kingdom must have been in existence in the sixth centuryB.C.Burnouf, "Introduction," p. 166 ff.

[403]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 427.

[404]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 407.

[405]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 245.

[406]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 237, 432.

[407]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 146, 514.

[408]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 423.

[409]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 175, 261, 380.

[410]If I ascribe the rise of Vishnu and Çiva primarily to the people, this is done because the need pointed out must have been felt most deeply by them; two rival deities would never have been elevated to supreme positions if the movement had not begun from beneath, and the life in two different districts had not formed the starting-point.

[411]Muir, "Sanskrit Texts," 4, 67 ff.

[412]"Vanaparvan," 484 ff. in Muir,loc. cit.4, 136.

[413]Muir,loc. cit.4, 124 ff., 127.

[414]Muir,loc. cit.4, 131, 252 ff. The epithet of Vishnu, Upendra,i. e.Beside-Indra, points to this position.

[415]Manu, 12, 121.

[416]Burnouf,loc. cit.p. 137; A. Weber, "Ind. Studien," 2, 20; Lassen, "Ind. Alterth." 12, 918.

[417]Muir,loc. cit.4, 300-320.

[418]Muir,loc. cit.4, 184, 230, 269. Lassen,loc. cit.12, 922. On the seats of the worship of Çiva on the coasts of the Deccan in the Mahabharata, cp. Muir,loc. cit.44, 28, 285.

[419]Nandinmeans having delight, delighted.

[420]In the book of the law Vishnu is mentioned once only (12, 121), and Çiva not at all. The old sutras of the Buddhists, on the other hand, as has been stated, mentioned Çiva frequently under the name Çankara, and Vishnu under the names Hari and Janardana. Lassen has rightly perceived that the Narayana of the ancient sutras and of the law-book was not yet Vishnu, but Brahman, and Narayana was not transferred to Vishnu till later ("Alterth." 12, 918; 22, 464). The Mahavança (7, 47, ed. Turnour) mentions Vishnu as the tutelary deity of the earliest settlers in Ceylon. This settlement took place about 500B.C., while Çiva appears as the tutelary deity of the somewhat more ancient Mathura in the south. The rise of the worship of Çiva and Vishnu according to these indications must be placed between 600 and 500B.C.Panini is acquainted with Avataras of Vishnu (Lassen,loc. cit.12, 921); in the accounts of the Greeks Krishna is already identified with Vishnu, and is widely worshipped both in the valley of the Ganges and in the extreme south of India, while Çiva is worshipped in the mountains. The development of this worship must therefore have taken place between 500 and 300B.C., and no doubt chiefly in the second part of this period.

So far as we can ascertain the conditions of the states on the Ganges in the sixth centuryB.C.the population suffered under grievous oppression. To the capricious nature of the sentences pronounced by the kings and the cruelty of their punishments were added taxes and exactions, which must have been severely felt over wide circles. The sutras tell us that a king who required money received this answer from his two first ministers: "It is with the land as with grains of sesame; it produces no oil unless it is pressed, cut, burnt, or pounded."[421]The arrangement of castes now stamped in all its completeness on the population of the Ganges; the irrevocable mission apportioned to each person at his birth; the regulations for expiation and penance, which the Brahmans had introduced; the enormous amount of daily offerings and duties; the laws of purification and food, the neglect or breach of which involved the most serious consequences, unless averted by the most painful expiations, were serious burdens in addition to the oppression exercised by the state. If the expiation of offences often unavoidable was difficult, the most carefully-regulated life, the most pious fulfilment of all offerings and penances, didnot protect men from evil regenerations. For time consumed the merit of good works, and man was born again to a new life,i. e.to new misery. Thus not even death brought the end of sorrow; it was not enough to bring to a close a laborious life; even if after this life a man were not tormented in hell for unexpiated transgressions, he was born again to ever new sorrows and pains. One way only was known to the Brahmans by which a man might possibly escape this fate;—flight from the world; the voluntary acceptance of the most severe unbroken torture imposed upon the body; the annihilation of the body and finally of the soul by absorption through meditation into Brahman. Did a man really arrive at the goal by this rough way?—did he by inexorable persecution of himself to the extremest limits become elevated above a new birth, and so above a new torture of life?

The conception of such endless torment must have pressed the more heavily upon the people as the hot climate in which they lived naturally awaked in them the desire for repose, a desire which increased with the increasing oppression of the state and religious duties, and was strengthened by the fact that these causes at the same time allowed the resistance which every healthy and strong nation can make to such oppressions and demands to slumber. But complaint was inadmissible. All the misfortune which a man had to bear now and expect in the future was not an unmerited disaster, but a just ordinance of the righteous arrangement of the world, the verdict and expression of divine justice itself. Whether any one was born as a man or an animal, his position and caste, and the conditions of his birth, the fortune he experienced, were consequences, the reward or punishment, of actions done in a previous state of existence; they were the sentences of ajustice which none could escape, of the divine order of the world, to which a man must submit without murmurs. The Brahmans were right, the world was full of evils; life was a chain of miseries, and the earth a vale of misery. Pity and grace were nowhere to be found, only justice and punishment, only righteous retribution. In past days, indeed, the Aryas had cried to Varuna to be gracious, to pardon and blot out the offences which men had committed against the gods, intentionally or involuntarily, from an evil heart or from weakness and seduction (p. 53). But the theory which the Brahmans had subsequently elevated to be the highest duty was without sympathy or pity; it could only allot to every man, in the alternation of birth and decay, the fruits of his deeds. No doubt the people, impelled by the necessity to have above them conceivable, comprehensible, helpful spirits, elevated Vishnu and Çiva from among the faded and dishonoured forms of the ancient deities to be the protecting powers of their life in opposition to the god of the Brahmans; but though these gave rain and increase to the pastures and the fields, though they cherished kindly feelings towards men, they were powerless against the punishments after death, against regenerations, or the existing order of the world, against the merciless justice of the gods, which recompensed every one inexorably according to his works, and caused every one to be born again without end to new torments. The old healthy pleasure in life which would live for a hundred autumns, and then looked forward to an entrance into the heaven of Yama, and participation in the joys of that heaven with the company of the fathers, was past. While all other nations almost without exception regarded death as the worst of evils, and painfully sought to secure continuance afterdeath, the Indians were now tortured by the apprehension that they could not die, that they must live for ever, they filled with terrors their conception of life after death, of the endless series of regenerations to a perpetually new life.

Was there really no mercy on earth or in heaven, no grace, no means of release from these never-ending torments? Was the long series of sacrifices with their endless prescripts for every step, the multitude of rules of purification, the performance of penance for every stain, absolutely indispensable if the Brahmans themselves allowed that this whole sanctity of works merely bestowed merits of a second rank, and that the treasure even of good works could be exhausted by time? Was this arrangement of castes and the observance of their duties absolutely irrevocable? The Brahmans required the study of the Veda not only from their own order but also from the Kshatriyas and the Vaiçyas. Did not the book of the law contain the requirement (p. 184) that every Dvija, after satisfying the duties of his order, and of the father of a family (Grihastha) should become an eremite (Vanaprastha) and penitent (Sannyasin)? Had not the Sankhya, the doctrine of Kapila, called in question the merit of the sacrifice and the customs of purification? Asceticism, it is true, again removed the distinctions of the orders; the power of penance, the mortification of the pleasures of sense and the body, carried back the members of the three upper orders in a similar way by sanctification, through a greater or less application of penance, into Brahman; the legends and the Epos showed by the example of Viçvamitra that a man could rise by the power of penance from a Kshatriya to a Brahman. Hence all Dvijas, in strictly logical sequence, could reach supreme salvation by mortification of the body;and it was easy from these premisses to draw the conclusion that little or nothing depended on descent; that the degree of asceticism and the depth of meditation was everything. If this was the case with sanctification by works; if birth in any one of the three higher orders did not prevent a man from attaining the highest sanctification by asceticism, could the castes be really different races, different emanations from Brahman, and distinct forms of his being? Was the nucleus of the system, the doctrine of the world-soul, so firmly established as the Brahmans maintained? Had not the philosophy of the Brahmans already passed from scholasticism to heterodoxy? Did it not deny, in the Sankhya doctrine, the authority of the Veda, the existence of the gods, and the Brahmanic world-soul? As we have seen, the teaching of Kapila left only two existences; nature and the individual spirit.

In the north-east of the land of the Koçalas, on the spurs of the Himalayas, by the river Rohini, which falls into the Çaravati (Rapti), a tributary of the Sarayu, in the neighbourhood of the modern Gorakhpur, lay a small principality named Kapilavastu, after the metropolis.[422]It was the kingdom of the race of the Çakyas, who are said to have migrated from Potala in the delta of the Indus into the land of the Koçalas. Like the kings of the Koçalas the race traced its descent to Ikshvaku, the son of Manu. And just as great priests of the ancient times were woven into the list of the ancestors of the kings of the Bharatas, so the Çakyas of Kapilavastu are said to have reckoned Gautama, one of the great saints (p. 28), among their forefathers; they called themselves Gautamas afterthe family derived from this priest. At the present time a Rajaputra family in the district, in which the Çakyas reigned, call themselves Gautamiyas.[423]To the house of the Çakyas belonged king Çuddhodana, who sat on the throne of Kapilavastu in the second half of the seventh centuryB.C.

Of the son born to this prince in 623B.C.the legend tells us that he received the name Sarvathasiddha (Siddhartha),i. e.perfect in all things, and that Asita, a penitent from the Himalayas, announced to the parents that a very high vocation lay before the boy. The young prince was brought up to succeed to the throne; he was instructed in the use of arms, and in all that it became one of his rank to know. After overcoming all the youths of the family of the Çakyas in the contest in his sixteenth year, his father chose Yaçodhara as his wife, and beside her he had two other wives and a number of concubines, with whom he lived in luxury and delight in his palaces. Thus he lived till his 29th year, when he saw, while on a journey to a pleasure-garden, an old man with bald head, bent body, and trembling limbs. On a second journey he met one incurably diseased, covered with leprosy and sores, shattered by fever, without any guide or assistance; on a third he saw by the wayside a corpse eaten by worms and decaying. He asked himself what was the value of pleasure, youth, and joy if they were subject to sickness, age, and death? He fell into reflection on the evils which fill the world, and resolved to abandon his palace, his wives, and the son who had just been born to him, and retire into solitude, that he might inquire into the causeof the evils which torment mankind, and meditate on their alleviation.

The legends tell us that Çuddhodana opposed this design; he would not allow his son, the Kshatriya and successor to his throne, to depart, and commanded festivals to be held to retain him. Siddhartha is surrounded by song, dance, and play, which are to enliven and change his mood. But in the night he mounted his horse and left the palace secretly, accompanied by one servant. After riding all night towards the east, he reached the land of the Mallas (on the spurs of the Himalayas, upon the Hiranyavati); there, in the neighbourhood of Kuçinagara, the metropolis of the Mallas (some 150 miles to the north-east of Patna), he gave in the morning his attire to his servant and sent him back with the horses. He retained only the yellow garment which he was wearing (yellow is the royal colour in India), and cut his hair short, in order to live henceforth as a mendicant. After concealing himself for seven days he passed on, begging his way to Vaiçali (to the south of Kuçinagara) and from Vaiçali down the Hiranyavati to the Ganges; beyond the Ganges he turned his course to the metropolis of Magadha, Rajagriha, near which were the settlements and schools of the most famous Brahmans.[424]Here he quickly learned all that the chiefs of the schools, Arada Kalama, Rudraka, and others could teach him, and understood their doctrines; but they could not adequately explain to him the origin of the sorrows of men, nor give him any assistance.

Dissatisfied with their instruction and doctrines Siddhartha resolved to retire wholly from the world, and live in the forest without fire, in order to penetrate to the truth by the most severe penances, the most profound meditations. He now called himself Çakyamuni,i. e.anchorite of the family of the Çakyas, went to the southern Magadha, and there, near the village of Uruvilva on the Nairanjana (an affluent of the Phalgu) he devoted himself to the most severe exercises. Seated without motion he endures heat and cold, storm and rain, hunger and thirst; he eats each day no more than a grain of rice or sesame. For six years he continues these mortifications, and still the ultimate truths refuse to disclose themselves to his reflections; at length he seemed to himself to observe that hunger weakened the power of his mind, and resolved to take moderate nourishment, honey, milk, and rice, which were brought to him by the maidens of Uruvilva.[425]Then he went to Gaya in the neighbourhood of Uruvilva, and there sank under a fig-tree into the deepest meditation. About the last watch in the night, when he had once more in spirit overcome all the temptations of the world, fear, and desire, when he had found that longing could never be laid to rest, only increased with satisfaction, as thirst that is quenched by drinking salt water—when he had called to mind his earlier births, and gathered up the whole world in one survey, revelation and complete illumination were vouchsafed to him.

For forty-nine or fifty days, as the legends assure us, Siddartha considered in his own mind whether he should publish this revelation, since it was difficult to understand, and men were in the bonds of ignorance and sin. At last he determined to proclaim to the world the law of salvation. When he had explained it to two merchants, travelling with their caravans through the forest of Gaya, he took his way first to Varanasi (Benares) on the Ganges (588B.C.). In thedeer-park near this city he preached for the first time, and though several of the hearers were astonished and said, "The king's son has lost his reason," he won over the first five disciples for his doctrine.[426]From this time the 'Enlightened' (Buddha), as the legends call him after the complete revelation was vouchsafed to him,[427]wandered as a mendicant, with a jar in his hand for collecting alms, through the districts of India, from Ujjayini (Ozene) at the foot of the Western Vindhyas[428]as far as Champa on the Ganges, the metropolis of the Angas, in order to proclaim everywhere the truth and the law of salvation. "Many," so Buddha preached, "impelled by distress, seek refuge in the mountains and forests, in settlements and under sacred trees. This is not the refuge which liberates from pain. He that comes to me for refuge will learn the four highest truths: pain, the origin of pain, the annihilation of pain, and the way that leads to the annihilation of pain. Whoever knows these truths is in possession of the highest refuge."[429]

Twelve years had elapsed since Buddha left his paternal city Kapilavastu, when at his father's invitation he returned thither; and his father, his kindred, the whole family of the Çakyas and many of his countrymen became converts to his doctrine. Surrounded by the most eager of his disciples, he proceeded onward, and was among them, as the legends say, "like the bull among the cows, like the elephant among his young ones, like the moon in the lunar houses, the physician among his patients."[430]Varanasiin the land of the Kaçis, Mithila in the land of the Videhas, Çravasti (to the north of Ayodhya) in the land of the Koçalas, Mathura in the land of the Çurasenas, Kauçambi in the land of the Bharatas, were the chief scenes of his activity.

Buddha was deeply penetrated by the conviction that the earth was a vale of misery, and the world nothing but a "mass of pain."[431]The sorrows which torture mankind excited his deepest compassion; he would fain help men in their distress. Above all he was oppressed with the thought that sorrows do not end with this life; that man is ever born again to new misery, driven without rest through an eternal alternation of birth and death, in order to find new sorrows without end, but no repose. He was tortured by this "restless revolution of the wheel of the world," by the torments of resurrection from another womb to new and greater pains; more eagerly than any other, Buddha sought repose, peace, and death without any resurrection. With the utmost eagerness he plunged into the Brahmanic theory and speculation; it did not satisfy him; in it, and by it, he found no alleviation, no end of the evil; he submitted to the severest asceticism of the Brahmans; it crushed his spirit without giving him rest. He therefore turned from the orthodox systems to the heterodox doctrine of Kapila. Even that failed to satisfy him; but he followed still further the path which it pointed out, in order to discover the liberation from evil which he sought so earnestly. At last he believed himself to be possessed of the delivering truth.

With the adherents of the Sankhya doctrine Buddha believed himself to have ascertained that neither the gods nor a supreme all-pervading world-soul exists. He also, in opposition to the orthodox doctrine,makes the individual soul his starting-point, and the multitude of individual spirits, which alone have true existence and reality. But if the doctrine of Kapila found the liberation from nature and the body in the fact that the soul attains the consciousness of her independent existence in opposition to nature, discovers her own absolute position as opposed to the body, and merely contemplates the latter, Buddha struck out a far more radical way for the liberation from evil and the freedom of the soul.

Buddha first establishes the fact that evil exists; then he inquires why it exists and must always exist; he attempts to prove that it can and ought to be annihilated, and finally he occupies himself with the means of this annihilation.[432]He who will ascertain truth and acquire freedom from evil, has first to convince himself that evil exists. Evil is birth, sickness, the weakness of age, the restlessness and torment of our projects and efforts, the inability to attain what we strive for, the separation from that which we love, the contact with that which we do not love. In this world of existence all is vanity. Happiness is followed by misfortune; even the happiness and power of kings flows away more rapidly than running water.[433]Mutability is the last and worst evil; it is the fire which consumes the three worlds.[434]Birth is changeable and worthless, for it leads to death; youth, for it becomes age; health, for it is subject to sickness. All that exists, passes away. This ceaseless change is bound up with pain and sorrow. Childhood suffers the pain of weakness; youth is impelled by desires which cannot befulfilled, and which cause pain if unfulfilled. Age suffers the pain of decay and sickness, and of death; with death begins a new life through regeneration to the same or even greater torments. To this evil of mutability, and consequently to pain, all living creatures without exception are subject. Evil and pain are universal; men are destined to lose what is dearest to them; and animals are destined to be eaten by each other. From the knowledge that evil exists, that all living creatures are subject to evil, follows the truth that men must strive to liberate themselves from evil.

After setting forth his problem in this formal and minutely systematic manner, Buddha goes still further. If man will free himself from pain, pain must be annihilated. In order to attain this end the cause of it must be discovered. This cause is desire (trishna). Desire is the passion which man feels to attain content and satisfaction, the ever-renewed impulse to have pleasant sensations and avoid the unpleasant, which is sometimes satisfied, but more frequently the reverse.[435]If pain is to be annihilated, desire must be annihilated. The cause of desire is sensation, and if we inquire into sensation we find on reflection that it is something transitory. When we have the sensation of what is pleasant, the sensation of what is unpleasant does not exist any longer, andvice versâ; sensation therefore is subject to annihilation, and in consequence is not permanent, nor has it any real existence. Sensation is, as the Buddhists say, "empty and without substance."[436]It does not belong to the nature of the soul. As soon as we can say of sensation or of any other object, "I am not this, this is not my soul," we are free from it; and when we have attained this knowledge, no sensationwhatever, nor conception, nor perception, exercises any charm over man.[437]If this knowledge is acquired, man is in a position to "unbind" himself from sensation, and as soon as he has unbound himself from sensation he has liberated himself from it; he feels neither inclination nor disinclination; neither restlessness nor pain, nor despair;[438]his heart no longer clings to the "causes of content, which were at the same time the causes of discontent, more closely than drops of rain to the leaf of the lotus."[439]If we go further in this direction and instruct ourselves by meditation that even the senses, eyes, ears, etc., are perishable,[440]that the body is subject to birth and death, and consequently that it is something transitory and without permanence, we are freed from the body and henceforth merely contemplate it. From this point of view we perceive that the body of a man is his executioner; and in the senses we recognise desolated villages, in the things of the external world, the enemies and plunderers which perpetually attack men, disquiet and ravage them.[441]Whatever a man has hitherto felt of dependence and inclination, of care and submissiveness to the body; whatever content and satisfaction he has felt through the body in the body,—is now annihilated by the knowledge that the body is nothing real, that it is not the soul. When we have reached this point, pain is removed, because the cause of it is removed; man is no longer dazzled by desire, and therefore no longer distressed; he is now lord of his senses and lord of himself. Freed from all bonds, from all inclinations to, and dependence on, the world, he feels the happiness and joy of repose.[442]

Thus far Buddha has agreed with the doctrine of Kapila that the soul must be separated and set free from the body, in his results, if the mode of development be different; he now proceeds in his speculations far beyond the Sankhya system. He was not content to have discovered the path of liberation from the torments of sensuality, of the body, and the external world; he asked further, How can man be raised above the necessity of perpetually renewing this process of the liberation of the soul from the body after new regenerations? If the Sankhya doctrine established nature and matter as an eternal potency beside the plurality of individual souls, and derived all existence from the creative power of matter, Buddha rather saw the creative power, the basis of all existence, in the individual souls, in the "breathing beings," and from this view arrived at a different, more thorough means of liberation.

According to the legends the way to this liberation was revealed to Buddha in the night under the fig-tree of Gaya, when in the deepest meditation he represented to himself the web of regenerations, how many and what dwellings he had inhabited previously, and how many had been the dwellings of other creatures; how he and the rest of the world lived through a hundred thousand millions of existences—when he called to mind the periods of destruction and the periods of regeneration. "There," he said, "was I, in that place; I bore this name; I was of this tribe and that family, and this caste; I lived so many years; I experienced this happiness and that misfortune.[443]After my death I was born again; I lived through these fortunes, and here, at last, I have again come to the light. Is there then no means of escaping this world, which is born,changes, and dies, and again grows up? Are there no limits to this accumulation of sorrows?" At last, attaining to immobility in thought about the last watch, just before the break of day, he once more collected his powers and asked himself:[444]What is the cause of age, death, and all pain? Birth. What is the cause of birth? Existence. What is the cause of existence? Attachment to existence. What is the cause of this attachment? Desire. What is the cause of desire? Sensation. Of sensation what is the cause? The contact of a man with things excites in him this or that sensation, sensation generally.[445]What is the cause of contact? The senses. What is the cause of the senses? Name and shape,i. e.the individual existence. What is the cause of this? Consciousness. And of consciousness, what? The existing not-knowledge,[446]i. e. the intellectual capacity; this is no other than the soul itself. In order to annihilate pain, birth must be annihilated; the annihilation of birth requires the annihilation of existence; this requires the destruction of attachment to existence; and to accomplish this destruction desire and sensation must be annihilated; and this again requires the annihilation of contact with the world. But as contact with the world rests on the receptivity of the senses, which in turn rests on the individual existence, this existence rests on consciousness, and consciousness on the not-knowledge,i. e.on the possibility of not-knowledge in the individual spirit, on the intellectual state; not-knowledge must in the end be annihilated. This takes place by the true knowledge, which shows that the sensationsof men are only of a transitory nature, illusions, not belonging to his true being; thus it is that the individual is loosed from pain and the body, or merely contemplates it as it contemplates all existence; and thus dependence on existence and desire are softened or removed. The same result is also attained by the annihilation of not-knowledge as the basis of individual existence, by the quenching of the individual, by Nirvana,i. e.the extinction, the "blowing away" by which the individual "falls into the void," and cannot be born again. From the annihilation of the basis of existence follows the annihilation of existence; it cannot arise again when the basis is destroyed.

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