the ram or lamb in the West died for the world once a year. At the autumnal equinox the Osiris, the Orpheus, the White Horse entered the wintry half year imaged by the ancients as the realms of Pluto. Hence the great Aswamêdha (horse sacrifice) of the Aryans. At the spring equinox (Easter) the sun-god, having been wept over by virgins, rose again. But as Buddhism was a protest against the animal sacrifice, the story of the spiritual awakening of an ascetic was substituted. All this disposes, I think, of M. Senart's theory that Buddha never lived. A new sun-myth had to be made for Buddha, and not a Buddha for a sun-myth.

H

CHAPTER VIII.

AN ANALYSIS OF THE LALITA VISTARA.

AN analysis of the Lalita Vistara seems to show portions due to at least three distinct schools, and, I may add, periods of Buddhism.

1. When Brahma was recognised as the Supreme God. 2. When Sâkya Muni had been promoted to the rank of Supreme God.

3. When the worship of annihilation was developing.

It is patent that in its main lines and framework the Lalita Vistara is an allegory, exhibiting a fallible man working up from the lower to the divine life. It is not pretended that he is without sin :—

'I have known the lusts of man, O charioteer, and my joy is fled!"

In the Chinese Life of Wung Puh there is a picturesque expression that the Prince revelled in the "five dusts;' and if the story means anything, its main purpose is to show how a mortal, subject to the chief miseries of existence, age, disease, and death, can find a mode of escape. Much ingenuity of alteration has been shown by later Buddhists, but the ribs and backbone of the story have proved too stout for them.

To know

The historical Buddha was a Brahmachârin. Brahma was the main object of these solitary mystics; and in the Lalita Vistara is much that is in harmonious keeping with such an historical character. Buddha constantly alludes to the "world of Brahma" and to Nirvâṇa, as if the two ideas were synonymous in his mind. Before

his last birth he was in the heaven Tusita, the sixth of the Devaloca, and therefore the nearest, according to Brahmin ideas, to the indestructible heaven of the immortal spirits, the Brahma heaven. The Prince is constantly described as being well versed in the "way of Brahma." He is eminently raised by his prayers." In the great competition for pretty Gôpa he excels all rivals in his knowledge of theology and worship, and also in "joining his hands in prayer." He certainly prays to Him of the Ten Hundred Eyes (the Omniscient) before riding away through the Gate of Benediction; and it is to be observed that Brahma is the title given to the father when Buddha as the Golden Germ is in the womb of his mother. And finally, in the great crisis of Buddha's struggle with the wicked one, the ascetic invokes Brahma, and at once the hellish legions are dispersed. An important subtlety has to be noticed here. All the influences that push the Prince along the higher pathway are from spirit-land. The king, the court, the pious priests, and even poor Gôpa, all mortals persistently attempt an opposite urging. There is one exception, Asita; but if he be not Aquarius, as I have suggested, his supernatural powers show at least that he was supposed to have attained the Bodhi and to be one with God. And in the Lalita Vistara these unseen guides all belong to the Brahma heavens; and a moment's reflection shows that this subtlety was a logical necessity to the original author of the allegory. None of the denizens of earth and of the six lower heavens had attained the great spiritual enlightenment; and the Prince, having reached the Tusita heaven, was as instructed as they. The Southern Canon, by banishing the ministering Jinas and Buddhas of the Northern Lalita Vistara, has completely stultified the whole original story. It was a mighty conflict between two great camps, the indestructible heaven of the immortal spirits and the domain of Kâma or Eros, whence the prominence given to the erotic principle in the struggle.

To one who holds that Buddhism started as a pure atheism, this question of Brahma is vital. In the Buddhist books there are two Brahmas-one a kind of bodyservant to Buddha, and the other the supreme Father. "Mahâ-Brahma offers flowers to the cloth that cleans my feet," says Buddha in one of the Cingalese versions of the Lalita Vistara,1

Thus the question arises: Did Brahma develop from the Supreme Being into a worshipper of foot-cloths, or was this last ideal the first in point of time? Those who boldly avow that the Brahmin ideas in what is called Northern Buddhism are a modern addition must really accept the latter almost inconceivable hypothesis. Buddha without doubt called his followers Brahmâņas, or seekers after Brahma. That fact has been allowed to remain patent in almost every page of the Dhammapada, the authenticated collection of his actual sayings; and a testimony that is quite invaluable, coming as it does from a school of Buddhist atheism, is supplied by Professor Beal's recent translation of the Chinese Dhammapada. Twice amongst the aphorisms of that work Buddha's Nirvâņa is alluded to as the heaven of Brahma.

"He who is humane does not kill; he is ever able to preserve life. This principle is imperishable. Whoever observes it, no calamity can betide that man. Politeness, indifference to worldly things, hurting no one, without place for annoyance, this is the character of the Brahma heaven. Ever exercising love towards the infirm, pure according to the teaching of Buddha; knowing when sufficient has been had; knowing when to stop; this is to escape (the recurrence of) birth and death.” 2

"There are eleven advantages which attend the man who practises mercifulness and is tender to all that lives. His body is always in health. He is blessed with peaceful sleep, and when engaged in study he is also composed. He has no evil dreams. He is protected by Devas and

1 Hardy's Manual, p. 185.

2 Beal's Dhammapada, p. 57.

loved by men. He is unmolested by poisonous things and escapes the violence of war. He is unharmed by fire or water. He is successful wherever he lives; and when dead, goes to the heaven of Brahma.” 1

This is precisely the language of the Lalita Vistara when speaking of Nirvâna :

"Stablish thy creatures in the way of Brahma and of the ten virtues, that when they die they may go to the abode of Brahma." 2

It is to be observed that the Chinese Dhammapada is divided into two portions-the sayings of Buddha, and a second portion consisting of parables to illustrate those sayings. So holy are the actual sayings considered, that it is stated that a parable has been written to illustrate every one. My quotations are taken from the sayings, but in a parable in another part of the volume certain Brahmin women are made to explain their wishes to Buddha :-"We desire above all things to escape the power of Yama and be born in the highest heaven."

To this the Buddha of the parable is made to reply that "the joys of heaven as well as the sorrows of earth are both to be avoided;" but immediately afterwards the Buddha of the authentic Dhammapada verses in illustration of the parable is made to say "The enlightened one . . avoids Yama, seizes heaven," &c.

In this and in one or two other passages we have the Nihilist of a later Buddhism trying to explain away Buddha's words.

I have proved, too, that even in the Cingalese canon it can be shown that the heaven of Brahma was originally considered the same as Nirvâņa, for Asita is made to state that he is shortly to proceed thither and end his re-births; that is, the crucial point. Thus those who hold that this Brahma idea is an after-growth of Northern Buddhism alone, and did not start at a time when such an idea was 2 Foucaux, p. 165.

1 Beal's Dhammapada, p. 58.