BUDDHIS/V'^ 
 
 AND n 
 
 Christia 
 
 ^':<i 
 
 rncs 
 
-THE- 
 -JOHN FRYER- 
 CHINESE- LIBRARY 
 
 1 
 
 iHAiAi LIBRAftY 
 
BUDDHISM 
 
 AND 
 
 ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS 
 
 BY 
 
 DR. PAUL CARUS 
 
 CHICAGO 
 THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 
 LONDON :— Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubnbr & Co, 
 
 1897 
 
• .• . • • 
 
 
 MainUb. 
 JOHN FRYER 
 CHINESE LIBRARY 
 
 Copyright, 1894, 1895, 1896, 1897, 
 
 By the open COURT PUBUSHING COMPANY, 
 
 CHICAGO, U. S. A. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 747802 
 
 C27 
 
 Page 
 Preface 5 
 
 The Origin of Buddhism 13 
 
 The Philosophy of Buddhism 39 
 
 The Psychological Problem 85 
 
 The Basic Concepts of Buddhism . . . .128 
 
 Buddhism and Christianity 166 
 
 Christian Critics of Buddhism . . . . . 237 
 
 Conclusion 308 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2007 with funding from 
 
 IVIicrosoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/buddhismitschrisOOcarurich 
 
PEEFACE. 
 
 Comparison is the best method of acquiring com- 
 prehension; and comprehension involves both the 
 discrimination of contrasts and the recognition of 
 similarities. Differences are upon the whole at 
 once apparent while similarities are hidden; but 
 the import of differences can, at the same time, not 
 be appreciated until the similarities are seen. Thus, 
 the discovery that the course of the moon and the 
 fall of a stone are both phenomena of gravitation, 
 becomes significant only when the difference of both 
 phenomena can be traced to a difference of conditions. 
 
 For this reason every religious man should study 
 other religions in order to understand his own re- 
 ligion ; and he must try to trace conscientiously 
 and lovingly the similarities in the various faiths in 
 order to acquire the key that will unlock to him 
 the law of the religious evolution of mankind. 
 
 The present book purports to be a contribution to 
 comparative religion, and it is one-sided because it 
 is addressed mainly to Christians, viz., to those 
 Christians who are anxious to acquire an insight 
 into the significance of Buddhist thought as it is at 
 its best. 
 
 Buddhism and Christianity are in many respects 
 
6 PREFACE. 
 
 SO similar as to appear almost identical ; in other 
 respects they exhibit such contrasts as to represent 
 two opposite poles ; and it is on this account that 
 a study of Buddhism is indispensable for a proper 
 comprehension of Christianity. 
 
 But what is true of Buddhism in its relation to 
 Christianity is not less true of Christianity in its re- 
 lation to Buddhism. When I think that this book 
 may be read by such Buddhists of Japan, Ceylon, or 
 Siam as are only superficially acquainted with Chris- 
 tianity, I feel like adding to its contents another 
 chapter that might easily be extended into a book, 
 in which I would refute their various misconcep- 
 tions of Christianity and urge them to send emis- 
 saries to Christian countries, especially to the Prot- 
 estants of Germany, England, and North America, 
 for the sake of investigating Christian modes of 
 worship. Christian institutions, and Christian ideals. 
 The importance of Christianity does not consist of 
 its dogmas, but in the spirit in which these dogmas 
 are interpreted and applied to the home life of 
 Christian congregations; and it is on these lines 
 that Buddhists can learn many valuable lessons 
 which Christian missionaries can only imperfectly 
 communicate to them. 
 
 The main advantage of Christianity over Bud- 
 dhism consists in the activity which it inspires. 
 Buddhism has to a great extent (with the excep- 
 tion, perhaps, of some Japanese sects) favored a pas- 
 sive attitude in life. In spite of Buddha's injunction 
 to be untiring and energetic, salvation was still 
 
PREFACE. 7 
 
 sought by many Buddhist saints in the suppression 
 of all aspirations* In spite of Buddha's rejection of as- 
 ceticism, and his declaration that hermit and layman 
 are alike, if they but free themselves of the illusion 
 of self, the ethics of world-flight after the fashion of 
 the old Yoga philosophers continued to be regarded 
 as the highest goal of religion. In spite of Buddha's 
 lessons of compassion, charity, and practically ap- 
 plied love toward all suffering creatures, the bliss 
 of Buddhahood was frequently sought more in the 
 state of an eternal, undisturbed happiness as is 
 afforded only after the riddance of all corporeality 
 in the abstraction of a pure spirituality and not in 
 helpfulness and struggles for further advance. On 
 all these lines Christianity, especially Christianity 
 as it is to-day in the United States, marks a decided 
 advance in the practical applications of Buddha's 
 own principles. In Christianity the principle is 
 dropped that the Buddha, the Christ, the Master, the 
 Blessed One must at the same time be the Happy 
 One. Bliss is not always happiness. In addition to 
 the paradoxes of Buddha's ethics, for instance, that 
 by giving away we gain and that hatred is conquered 
 by love, we learn through Christ that the Blessed 
 One may be the Suffering One, and that the man of 
 peace may be the boldest struggler. 
 
 Christianity is less philosophical than Buddhism ; 
 Christ proclaims no theory of soul ; he says nothing 
 about the nature of things, and never enters into 
 metaphysical inquisitions of any kind. The Chris- 
 tian theories of creation, of God's personality and 
 
8 PREFACE. 
 
 trinity, of the nature of the soul and the mode of 
 resurrection were made later on by the church fath- 
 ers and church councils. Christ expressly declared 
 that he spoke in parables. But this humbler 
 method of popular teaching was more effectual than 
 Buddha's philosophy. Whatever may be said in 
 favor of Buddhism, its profundity, its cosmic uni- 
 versality, and the loftiness of its morality, the great 
 strength of Christianity lies in the lesson of Gol- 
 gotha, which means, salvation lies not alone in the 
 attainment of the truth, but in struggling for it, 
 in living for it, in suffering for it, and in dying for 
 it. 
 
 The heaven of Christian dogmatology is too 
 mythological for a scientist and the Kirvana of \j 
 Buddhists too abstract for the mass of the people. 
 The former is in its popular form not acceptable in 
 our present age of scientific exactness, and the latter 
 is after the Asiatic mode of thinking, too much con- 
 ceived in its negative aspects, and if the attempt is 
 made to show its positive features. Nirvana appears 
 as mere being instead of doing; as mere rest in- 
 stead of efficacy, as a state of abstract indifference 
 instead of a definite condition of existence. 
 
 A comparison with Christian views will help 
 Buddhists better to define their own faith. But 
 what, above all, is most needful for both parties is 
 the adoption of exact and scientific methods of 
 investigation in the fields of psychology and phi- 
 losophy. 
 
 There is a rivalry between Christianity and Bud- 
 
PREFACE. 9 
 
 dhism, more so than between other religions, and 
 the question is which will be the first to clarify our 
 conceptions of the religious goal of mankind in 
 plain terms, so as to suit the practical demands 
 of life, the Christians or the Buddhists. Christians 
 can learn much of Buddhism ; and Buddhists can 
 learn much of Christianity. The final victory in 
 their competition will be with those who learn 
 most of the other. 
 
 Christianity conquered other religions by adopt- 
 ing of them that which was good. It adopted of 
 the Greek the Logos philosophy and of the Teutons 
 the ethics of struggle and energetic endeavor. It 
 is only since Christianity refused to assimilate new 
 truths, that its progress was checked ; and the same 
 is true of Buddhism. The religious future of a re- 
 ligion depends upon the spiritual vitality of its rep- 
 resentatives, and vitality means capacity of growth. 
 
 Mankind does not want Buddhism, nor Islam, nor 
 Christianity ; mankind wants the truth, and the truth 
 is best brought out by an impartial comparison. 
 There is probably no human mind free from error, 
 but he who " proves all and keeps the best " is most 
 likely to attain to perfection. 
 
 Missionaries are religious ambassadors. Their 
 duty consists not only in the propagation of their 
 OAvn religion, but also in the acquisition of a perfect 
 comprehension of the religion of those people to 
 whom they are sent, and Christians can justly pride 
 themselves on the fact that all their great mission- 
 aries, such men as Duff, Judson, Hardy, Beal, Legge, 
 
10 PBEFACB. 
 
 and others, every one in his field, did an enormous 
 amount of work which served to widen our own 
 knowledge of the religious views that prevail in 
 India, Ceylon, Burmah, and China. Indeed, had it 
 not been for their labors, comparative religion would 
 have made little advance. And I would not hesitate 
 to say that the most successful part of their work 
 consisted, not in making a few converts abroad, but 
 in widening the horizon of the people who had 
 sent them. Such is the advantage of an exchange 
 of thought on the most important questions of life, 
 that it would be a blessing all around if the non- 
 Christian religions also decided, on a larger scale, 
 to send missionaries to Europe and America in 
 order to have among Christians their faith worth- 
 ily represented, to facilitate comparison and invite 
 investigation. " .' 
 
 Mankind is destined to have one religion, as it will 
 have one moral ideal and one universal language, 
 and the decision as to which religion will at last be 
 universally accepted, cannot come about by accident. 
 Science will spread, maybe, slowly but unfailingly, 
 and the universal acceptance of a scientific world- 
 conception bodes the dawn of the Religion of Truth, 
 — a religion based upon plain statements of fact 
 unalloyed with myth or allegory. In the eventual 
 conditions of religious life, there may be a difference 
 of rituals and symbols, nay, even of names, accord- 
 ing to taste, historical tradition, and individual 
 preference, but in all essentials there will be one 
 religion only, for there is only one truth, which re- 
 
PKEFACE. 11 
 
 mains one and the same among all nations, in all 
 climes, and under all conditions. 
 
 The law of the survival of the fittest holds good 
 also in the domain of spiritual institutions. And let 
 us remember that the greatest power lies not in 
 numbers, not in wealth, not in political influence, 
 but in truth. Whatever may be the fate of the 
 various faiths of the world, we may be sure that the 
 truth will prevail in the end. 
 
'^^ ^.^? , 7^' 
 
 THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 
 
 BRAHMANISM THE CRADLE OF BUDDHISM. 
 
 About two and a half millenniums ago, India 
 was already in a very prosperous condition. The 
 land yielded rich harvests ; industries and arts 
 flourished ; and science kept abreast with the ma- 
 terial development of civilization. Logic, however, 
 and abstract reasoning had attained an unusually 
 high development, for in these arts the ancient In- 
 dians were masters above all other nations in the 
 world. 
 
 In those days the religious question was, perhaps, 
 for the first time, recognized in its full importance, 
 and led to investigations, discussions and various 
 modes of solution. The central problem which lies 
 at the root of all religion is concerned with the 
 origin of, and the deliverance from, evil. We are 
 thirsting for life, not only for life in general, but 
 for individual life, for the preservation of our per- 
 sonal existence, its continuance, welfare, and further 
 evolution ; yet life involves us in pain, misery, labors, 
 struggles, sickness, old age and death. The very 
 
 contents of life seem to be made up of evils, as a 
 
 13 
 
14 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 means of escape from which religion was sought, 
 and the religior. of India was in those days, as it is 
 now again, Brahmanism. 
 
 * Brahir.anisni is a system of ceremonies, prayers 
 and sacrifices by which men attempt to win the 
 favor of the gods. The doctrines of Brahmanism 
 are contained in their sacred writings called the 
 Yedas, which were supposed to have been revealed 
 by divine inspiration. The purpose of sacrifice was 
 threefold : (1) we read in the Yishnu-purana," By sac- 
 rifices the gods are nourished," and (2) in the Tandya- 
 brahmana the limb of the victim consigned to the 
 fire of the altar is called "the expiation for sins 
 committed, by the gods, by our ancestors, by other 
 men now living, and by ourselves." But the dearest 
 hope of the Hindu was (3) to acquire through sacri- 
 fices supernatural powers. 
 
 The Hindu world-conception as it appears in the 
 Y^dic literature may be called a loose monism. It 
 is a unitary world-conception containing a polythe- 
 istic mythology, the meaning of which, however, is 
 frankly declared to be pantheistic. Brahma is the 
 One and All, and he reveals himself in all the various 
 divinities. We read in the Isa Upanishad : * 
 
 " Whate'er exists within this universe 
 Is all to be regarded as enveloped 
 By the great Lord, as if wrapped in a vesture. 
 There is one only Being who exists 
 Unmoved, yet moving swifter than the mind ; 
 Who far outstrips the senses, though as gods 
 * Quoted from Sir Monier Williams's '* Hinduism," p. 45. 
 
 / 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 15 
 
 They strive to reach him ; who himself at rest 
 Transcends the fleetest flight of other beings ; 
 Who, like the air, supports all vital action. 
 He moves, yet moves not ; he is far, yet near ; 
 He is within this universe. Whoe'er beholds 
 All living creatures as in him and him — 
 The universal Spirit — as in all. 
 Henceforth regards no creature with contempt." 
 
 The social system of ancient India divided the 
 people rigorously into four castes : the Brahmans or 
 priests, the Kshatriyas or warriors, the Yaishyas or 
 traders and agriculturists, and the Shudras, or the 
 lowly class of the conquered population. The first 
 three are Aryans ; the last mentioned, the original 
 inhabitants of India. 
 
 THE DAESANAS OF ANCIENT INDIA. 
 
 There were six philosophies (Darsanas) in ancient 
 India : 1. The Mimansa, founded by Jaimini ; 2. The 
 Yedanta, whose main representative was Sankara- 
 charya ; 3. The Yaisheshika, founded by Kanada • 
 4. The l^yana, founded by Gotama; 5. The Sam- 
 khya, founded by Kapila ; and 6. The Yoga. The 
 first two, Mimansa and Yedanta, may briefly be 
 characterized as an exegesis of the Yedas. The 
 Yedas are said to be eternal and their authority is 
 recognized as absolute. The aim of the Mimansa is 
 to explain unintelligible passages of the Yedic texts 
 and to give reliable information concerning the 
 proper performances of ceremonies and sacrifices. 
 The Yedanta, which literally means the end or aim 
 
16 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 of the Y^das, reduces the religious doctrines of the 
 Yedas to scientifically exact terms. Its trend is a 
 philosophy which is called Advaita or non-duality, a 
 spiritualistic monism, or rather a pantism, teaching 
 the doctrine that Brahma, the universal soul, is the 
 all, and the only true reality, while all things and 
 individual beings are mere appearance, a product of 
 illusion (Maya) and ignorance (Avidya). 
 
 The Yaisheshika and Nyana belong together. 
 The founder of the Yaisheshika is only known by 
 his nickname Kanada which means " Atom-eater." 
 The peculiarity of his philosophy consists in his 
 method of classification. There are six categories : 
 Substance, quality, action, generality of properties, 
 particularity and inherence. The disciples of Kanada 
 add as a seventh category, non-existence. The fifth 
 category, particularity {vaishes?ia\ gave the name 
 to the system. Keality is conceived of as an infinite 
 variety of particular units or atoms, the infinite 
 nature of which remains constantly the same. The 
 atoms are self-existent, uncaused and eternal. An 
 invisible force {adrishta) is the forming principle. 
 Man's soul {purusha) is supposed to be without be- 
 ginning and without end, all-pervading and omni- 
 present in space. The action of the soul depends 
 upon mind {manas\ which, in contrast to the dif- 
 fused nature of the soul, is conceived as an atom 
 capable of being in one place only at a time. This 
 artificial idea of an all-pervading soul and a monad- 
 mind, or manas, was invented to account for the 
 fact that man can think of one thing at a time only, 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 17 
 
 while he is at the same time conscious of possessing 
 deeper spiritual resources. 
 
 The ]^yana philosophy is a mere extension of the 
 Yaisheshika. It adopts the atomic theory and 
 psychology of the latter and adds expositions of the 
 method of inquiry. It might best be characterized 
 as a system of formal logic applied to practical rea- 
 soning. Later representatives of the Yaisheshika 
 and the Kyana admitted a certain theism, but their 
 god is not like the Christian God, the creator of the 
 world, but only one extraordinarily powerful in- 
 dividual soul which has become omnipresent and 
 omniscient through the accumulation of merit in 
 former existences, and is now exempt from migra- 
 tion, enjoying the unfathomable bliss of needing no 
 deliverance. 
 
 The Samkhya philosophy is dualistic, propounding 
 the theory of a radical difference of self or soul or 
 subjective being, and the objectivity of material 
 bodies ; it assumes the eternal existence and reality 
 of both matter and soul, or rather souls, for Kapila 
 assumed the existence of an indefinite number of 
 souls. He argued : Impure matter cannot originate 
 from pure spirit or vice versa ; and he denied at the 
 same time in unequivocal terms the existence of a 
 creator, for there is no creation out of nothing, and 
 all becoming is transformation according to law. 
 Samkhya means " enumeration," which name has 
 probably been chosen on account of the enumeration 
 of the principles of Samkhya philosophy, which 
 sketch the evolution of the present form of existentje 
 
18 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHKISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 from the undifferentiated primordial matter called 
 prakriti — the unproduced producer and the rootless 
 root of all things. 
 
 The Yoga philosophy adopts the theories of the 
 Samkhya, adding to them the practice of meditation 
 and self -induced trances. The means of self-hypnoti- 
 zation consisted in abstraction from the outer world 
 and the concentration of the mind on itself with the 
 aim of isolating the soul from matter and thus gain- 
 ing deliverance. 
 
 "We might mention as a seventh school the mate- 
 rialistic philosophy of the Charvakas or Lokayatas, 
 founded by Yrihaspati. They recognize only sense- 
 perception as a source of knowledge and reject the 
 reliability of logical inference. They regard only 
 the four elements — earth, air, fire, and water — as 
 real, and consider intelligence as a transient product 
 of these elements. Soul is to them identical with 
 the body, and all phenomena are declared to be 
 purely mechanical processes. They ridicule sacrifices 
 as much as devotion and penance, and do not believe 
 in the retribution of moral justice. The Charvakas 
 have never succeeded in becoming a recognized school 
 or producing any literary documents of importance. 
 We know them only through the arguments of their 
 adversaries who mention their theories merely for 
 the purpose of refuting them. 
 
 There are certain ideas which cannot be credited 
 to any one of the various schools, because they have 
 come to be the common propert}^ of Indian thought ; 
 they are briefly stated as follows : 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 19 
 
 1. The irrefragability of the law of causation, 
 which is said to be as rigid in the sphere of morals as 
 in the physical world. It is called " the law of Kar- 
 ma, which means that our existence is the exact 
 product of our deeds done in our present and in for- 
 mer existences, and that our sufferings are just pun- 
 ishments for sins previously committed, while the 
 advantages we enjoy are the rewards for former 
 merits. 
 
 2. The transmigration of souls according to their 
 
 Karma. 
 
 3. The pain of Samsara (the circuit of life), which 
 means that the eternal repetition of soul-migration 
 implicates us in evils of all kinds, especially birth, 
 disease, old age, and death ; or briefly, that life is 
 suffering. 
 
 4. The salvation of Nirvana, that is to say, the 
 aim of all moral aspirations is to reach the calm and 
 peaceful bliss of JSTirvana, which is a deliverance 
 from the evils of Samsara. 
 
 THE SAMKHYA PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 The Samkhya philosophy is of special interest in 
 so far as it forms the starting-point of Buddhistic 
 thought. We cannot understand Buddhism without 
 considering the great influence of the dualism and 
 pessimism exercised on Indian thinkers by the Sam- 
 khya philosophy. 
 
 As in Sanskrit, soul and man are expressed by the 
 same word (Purusha), matter was naturally com- 
 
20 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 pared to a woman, a favorite simile employed not 
 only by many dualistic philosophers, but also by Gior- 
 dano Bruno, the great martyr and champion of mon- 
 ism who stands at the threshold of modern thought. 
 But while Giordano represents the female principle, 
 matter, as passive and the male principle, spirit, 
 as active, Kapila represents matter as active and soul 
 as passive, reminding us of the quite modern view of 
 some French psychologists who describe conscious- 
 ness as a mere accompaniment of the physiological 
 brain motions, which latter alone are said to be active 
 and efficient to serve as causes in the bodily system. 
 Soul, according to the Samkhya view, is the princi- 
 ple of apperception, while matter is that which pro- 
 duces effects in the world of reality. Their union 
 as we find it in living organisms is compared to a 
 lame man mounted on a blind man. Matter, the 
 kind man, is said to be the faithful servant of 
 the soul, the lame man. The exertions of the for- 
 mer are solely for the benefit of the latter. As 
 soon as the soul becomes disgusted with the rest- 
 lessness of the material world, matter ceases to be 
 active ; it is recognized as inane and becomes inert, 
 while the soul after its separation from matter enjoys 
 deliverance (Apavarga), which is the highest bliss 
 attainable. At the close of the introduction of a 
 Samkhya text-book (the Samkhya Pravacana-Bha- 
 shya) the following four propositions are added, 
 which bear a close resemblance to the four noble 
 truths of Buddha. "We read : 
 1. That from which we deliver ourselves is pain. 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 21 
 
 2. Deliverance is the cessation of pain. 
 
 3. The cause of pain is the lack of distinction be- 
 tween soul and matter, which produces their con- 
 tinued union. 
 
 4. The means of deliverance is the discerning cog- 
 nition. 
 
 Kapila rejected the methods of salvation proposed 
 by the Brahmans, which were sacrifices, prayers and 
 ceremonies. They may be granted to alleviate pain, 
 but they do not free us from the cause of pain and 
 therefore cannot make its return forever impossible. 
 Kapila argues : Since pain lasts only so long as the 
 soul is in connection with the body and the bodily 
 organs, salvation can be obtained only by the abso- 
 lute separation of soul and body, which must be 
 affected through a cognition of the difference be- 
 tween soul and body. 
 
 The practical application of the Samkhya philos- 
 ophy led to asceticism. Self -mortification, in the 
 literal sense of the word, was supposed to be the 
 means of salvation. The body must be killed. It 
 must become dead so that the soul may live in a 
 state of pure spirituality and the struggle for a pain- 
 less existence became identical with the attempt of 
 reaching a state of bodiless soul-life. Matter was 
 denounced as the source of all evil, the three qualities 
 of matter (the three gunas) which as they affect us 
 in three ways were called good {sattva), bad {raja\ 
 and indifferent (tamas), were compared to a triple 
 rope by which the soul is bound ; but pure spirit 
 was supposed to be free from pain, old age and death. 
 
22 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 There were many serious men in those days who 
 tried to realize the ideal of this ascetic dualism. 
 Fasts and self-mortifications were carried to their 
 extremes, and if, as a natural consequence, trances 
 with ecstatic visions appeared, those morbid states 
 were considered as the first hopeful symptoms of a 
 partial deliverance of the soul. But a radical sepa- 
 ration of body and soul and an actual deliverance 
 from evil were not attained in this way. 
 
 The more the Samkhya ideas gained ground, the 
 higher grew the repute of the yoga-practice of at- 
 taining deliverance by entering into trances. 
 
 THE APPEARANCE OF BUDDHA. 
 
 The religious ideal of delivering mankind from 
 evil had become so general that many teachers ap- 
 peared, hermits, ascetics, and philosophical thinkers 
 of all kinds, who pretended to have found the way 
 of salvation, which would lead to Nirvana, to the 
 extinction of all misery, to peace and happiness ; 
 and a man who had attained perfect enlightenment 
 so as to be able to show to mankind the way of sal- 
 vation was called Buddha. 
 
 Among the Buddhas who appeared in those days 
 there were two whose doctrines led to the foun- 
 dation of religions which still exist. One of them is 
 Yardhamana, the son of Jnata, frequently called 
 Jnataputra, who lived at the end of the sixth and at 
 the beginning of the fifth century b. c. He is the 
 founder of the Jain sect, which at the present day 
 
THE ORIGIN OP BUDDHISM. 23 
 
 numbers almost half a million adherents in India, 
 most of whom are said to belong to the richest and 
 most aristocratic classes of the Hindus. The other 
 Buddha is Gautama Siddhartha, the son of a wealthy 
 land-owner at Kapilavastu. He is a younger contem- 
 porary of Yardhamana ; he lived in the fifth century 
 B. c. and is the founder of Buddhism. 
 
 Buddha's religion has been and may be considered 
 as a further development of the Samkhya philosophy, 
 because it shows in many details traces of Samkhya 
 terms and modes of thought. But Buddha changed 
 the foundation of the system, overcame its dualism, 
 and applied the new doctrine thus gained to practical 
 life. He became the most powerful, the boldest, 
 and most radical reformer that ever appeared in the 
 history of mankind. From the Samkhya philos- 
 ophers Buddha adopted the doctrine of the exist- 
 ence of misery and the attempt to deliver man from 
 evil, seeking salvation through enlightenment. Like 
 them he expressed his doctriite in a fourfold formula. 
 Like them he acknowledged the rigidity of the law 
 of causation, and pushed its application so far as 
 to deny frankly the efficacy of prayer, rituals, and 
 sacrifices. Indeed Buddha lost no opportunity of 
 denouncing bloody sacrifices as unnecessary, cruel, 
 and inhuman. He disregarded caste distinction and 
 denied the divine inspiration of the Yedas, in conse- 
 quence of which he was considered as irreligious by 
 orthodox Brahmans. And yet his irreligious atti- 
 tude was only a protest against religious super- 
 stitions and abuses. But Buddha differed from the 
 
24 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Samkhya philosophy not less thoroughly than from 
 the Brahmans in ethics. His idea of enlightenment 
 was not merely the recognition of a theor}^, but the 
 basis for an energetic activity. Enlightenment, 
 according to Buddha, teaches morality, and he re- 
 jected asceticism as injurious, showing his disciples, 
 as he called it, the " middle way," which abstains 
 from both extremes, self -mortification and self- 
 indulgence. Having subjected himself to a rigorous 
 asceticism, he came to the conclusion that by thus 
 subduing the body the mind was crippled. The 
 mind became dimmed after severe fasts, and deliver- 
 ance could not be obtained. He recognized that our 
 evil desire, and not material existence, was the root 
 of evil, and proposed as a remedy neither self- 
 mortification nor the beatific visions of the yoga, 
 nor the prayer and sacrifices of the Brahmans, but 
 the radical extinction of desire. Buddha saw for the 
 first time clearly that the religious problem was a 
 moral problem ; that pain is only a transient evil 
 which need not concern us ; that the real evil is sin ; 
 that the root of sin is to be found in the lust of the 
 mind ; and that he who harbors no lust or ill-will in 
 his heart will naturally walk in the path of right- 
 eousness. Take away desire and you destroy evil 
 at its root. 
 
 Kapila's dualism proclaimed that a distinction 
 existed between soul and body, yet Kapila regarded 
 man's sensations and thoughts and desires as mate- 
 rial. The soul was to him a transcendent being, 
 which by a kind of sublimated body (similar to the 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 25 
 
 so-called astral body of our modern theosophists, 
 and supposed to reside in the material body) was 
 implicated in the world of matter. This meta- 
 physical soul-being of the Samkhya philosophy was 
 supposed to be the apprehending principle in all 
 psychic activities. It was said, that the eye does 
 not see, the ear does not hear, and thoughts do not 
 think, but it is that mysterious something called 
 atman, i. e., self or soul, which is the smeller in the 
 nose, the taster in the tongue, the seer in the eye, 
 the thinker of our thoughts, and the doer of our acts. 
 
 Kapila assumed an innumerable number of souls, 
 which made his system intricate and invited the 
 criticism exercised by his great successor, Gautama, 
 who went so far as to deny the existence of the 
 atman, a theory which is generally called a denial of 
 the existence of the soul. 
 
 We have to add here that the translation of atman 
 by soul is very misleading. Buddha did not deny 
 the existence of our feelings, sentiments, ideas and 
 ideal aspirations. He only denied the existence of 
 a hypothetical soul-subject which is supposed to be 
 the principle or agent of our psychical activity. He 
 denied the metaphysical soul-entity, not the soul it- 
 self. He rejected Kapila's dualism, but he did not 
 fall into the opposite extreme of materialism ; and 
 strange to say, he anticipated the modern conception 
 of the soul as it is now taught by the most advanced 
 scientists of Europe. 
 
 Buddha's world-conception at the same time coin- 
 cides with the theory of evolution. Every organ- 
 
26 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 ism, according to Buddha, consists of samskaras, 
 generally translated "confections," that is, soul- 
 structures, formations or dispositions which through 
 function have originated in a gradual development. 
 All creatures are the product of an immeasurably 
 long chain of deeds. They are the result of their 
 Karma. 
 
 Man also is a bundle of samskaras ; his eye is the 
 product of seeing, resulting from sensation under the 
 influence of light ; his ear is the product of hearing, 
 resulting from sensation under the influence of 
 sounds ; and in the same way all the organs of our 
 bodily and of our spiritual organizations are the 
 product of deeds transmitted to us either directly by 
 inheritance or indirectly by education. These sam- 
 skaras constitute our being. The eye sees, the ear 
 hears ; our thoughts think. There is no metaphys- 
 ical entity behind them as their agent, but these sam- 
 skaras, or soul-forms, constituting our existence are 
 transmitted by action, word and example, to others. 
 There is, accordingly, no soul migration, but there 
 is rebirth ; viz., there is a reappearance of the same 
 type of soul. Our samskaras impress themselves 
 on and they continue in others. Death is only the 
 discontinuance of their presence in the special body 
 of an individual ; but death is not the annihilation of 
 a man's karma, for his karma continues according to 
 the law of causation. Death does not annihilate the 
 samskaras who continue in following generations 
 according to the deeds done during life. Thus death 
 disappears in Buddha's soul-conception, and the 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 27 
 
 realities of our psychical existence are recognized in 
 their pre-existence as well as in their continuation 
 after death. 
 
 The Buddhistic view of immortality which is 
 based on the denial of the atman is forcibly ex- 
 pressed in the Buddhist canon. Buddha, having at- 
 tained enlightenment, met on his way Upaka, a 
 young Brahman and a former acquaintance of his. 
 Upaka said to Gautama : " Your countenance, friend, 
 is serene, and your eyes are bright, indicating purity 
 and blessedness." And Buddha, having told Upaka 
 that he had attained deliverance, adds (according to 
 the translation of Prof. Samuel Beal from a Chinese 
 text) : " I am now going to the city of Benares to 
 establish the kingdom of righteousness, to give light 
 to those enshrouded in darkness and open the gate 
 of Immortality to men." * 
 
 Buddha's idea of salvation is ultimately based on 
 enlightenment, and enlightenment is to him the rec- 
 ognition of the nature of things. We are confronted 
 with evil and find the root of all evil in the way- 
 wardness of our own heart. There is the notion 
 that our inmost existence is an ego-entity, but this 
 is an error ; it is the illusion of self, for the preser- 
 
 * The romantic legend of Sakya Buddha translated from the 
 Chinese Sanskrit by S. Beal, p. 245. The translation of the 
 corresponding passage from the Pali reads, according to Rhys 
 Davids, as follows : I am now going to establish the kingdom 
 of righteousness. For this purpose I am going to the city of 
 Benares, to give light to those enshrouded in darkness and to 
 open the gate of Immortality to men. 
 
28 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 vation of which we are so anxious. Selfhood is the 
 source of vanity, egotism and sin. There is no 
 moral wrong but it has its ultimate root in selfhood. 
 Knowing, now, that selfhood is an illusion, that this 
 limited individuality of ours is only a temporary 
 abode of the soul, whose stream flows on uninter- 
 ruptedly, we learn the transitoriness of the ills that 
 the flesh is heir to, and identify the true self of our 
 real being with those immortal elements of our soul 
 which are not touched by death. Buddha's ideal, 
 accordingly, is the utter annihilation of all thought 
 of self and the preservation of all that is in conform- 
 ity with enlightenment. The utter extermination 
 of desire alone can afford a final deliverance from 
 the evil of existence, leading to that absolute peace 
 of mind which is called Nirvana. 
 
 Buddha rejected the religious superstition that 
 there was any merit in ceremonies and sacrifices ; 
 but he rejected also the monkish ethics of asceticism, 
 proclaiming openly and without equivocation that 
 holiness cannot be attained by self -mortification and 
 austerities, but only by a radical surrender of all self- 
 ish desire. 
 
 Gautama Siddhartha, the founder of Buddhism, 
 was what to-day would be called a freethinker, for 
 his religion is different from Brahmanism, in so far 
 as he promises no help from Brahma or any other 
 Deity, but enjoins its devotees to rely upon them- 
 selves, and have no other guide but the truth. 
 " Hold fast to the truth as to a lamp," were the 
 significant words of Buddha in his farewell address 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 29 
 
 to his disciples before he died. He bowed to no au- 
 thority, and set up no creed, no dogma. He denied 
 the divine inspiration of the Yedas, the sacred 
 scriptures of Brahmanism, refused to recognize 
 castes, rejected rituals as irrelevant, denounced sac- 
 rifices as inhuman, ridiculed prayer as useless, dis- 
 dained worship, refused to believe in the creation of 
 the world by an Ishvara (i. e., a good Lord and per- 
 sonal God), and denied the existence of a soul-entity 
 or atman. In a word, he opposed all the favorite 
 notions of Brahmanism, the religion of his time. 
 And yet he was not an irreligious man. On the 
 contrary, he was deeply religious, and certainly 
 more religious than any of the priests of his age 
 who denounced him as irreligious. Such was the 
 influence of his powerful personality that his disci- 
 ples spread his doctrine over all Asia, and his relig- 
 ion has even in its aberrations preserved the moral 
 earnestness of its founder. 
 
 Of special interest is the method in which the 
 Brahmanical belief of Brahma as the creator, gov- 
 ernor and Lord over all things is treated in Budd- 
 histic literature. As an instance we quote from the 
 Digha-Mkaya, XL 67, where a certain priest is in- 
 troduced who goes in quest of a philosophical prob- 
 lem. After having addressed all the sages, kings, 
 and gods, he comes at last to Brahma himself. And 
 Brahma says : "I, O priest, am Brahma, Great 
 " Brahma, the Supreme Being, the Unsurpassed, 
 " the Perceiver of All Things, the Controller, the 
 " Lord of All, the Maker, the Fashioner, the Chief, 
 
30 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHKISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 " the Yictor, the Euler, the Father of All Beings 
 " "Who Have Been and Are to Be." The priest, 
 having patiently listened to this self-definition, calls 
 Brahma's attention to his question, saying: "My 
 " friend, * I am not asking yon. Are you Brahma, 
 " Great Brahma, the Supreme Being, etc. ? but I ask 
 " you a question which I should like to have an- 
 " swered." But Brahma, instead of replying to the 
 question, repeats his speech a second and a third time, 
 and when the priest is not to be quieted in this way 
 Brahma takes the questioner by the arm, leads him 
 aside and says to him in a whisper : " O priest, these 
 gods of " my suite believe as follows : Brahma sees all 
 " things, knows all things, has penetrated all things. 
 " Therefore was it that I did not answer you in 
 " their presence. I do not know the answer to your 
 " question. Therefore it was a sin and a crime that 
 " you left the Blessed One and went elsewhere in 
 '* quest of an answer. Turn back, O priest, and 
 " having drawn near to the Blessed One, ask him 
 " this question, and as the Blessed One shall explain 
 " unto you, so believe." 
 
 Concerning Buddha's atheism the following pas- 
 sage quoted from Max Mtiller's essay on " Buddhist 
 Mhilism " is instructive. Max Miiller says : 
 
 "As to Atheism, it cannot be denied that, if we 
 call the old gods of the Yeda — Indra and Agni, and 
 Yama — gods, Buddha was an Atheist. He does not 
 believe in the divinity of those deities. What is 
 noteworthy is that he does not by any means deny 
 their bare existence, just as little as St. Augustine 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 31 
 
 and other Fathers of the Church endeavored to 
 subiimize, or entirely explain away, the existence of 
 the Olympian deities. The founder of Buddhism 
 treats the old gods as superhuman beings, and prom- 
 ises the believers that they shall after death be re- 
 born into the world of the gods, and shall enjoy 
 divine bliss with the gods. Similarly he threatens 
 the wicked that after death they shall meet with 
 their punishment in the subterranean abodes and 
 hells, where the Asuras, Sarpas, N^agas, and other 
 evil spirits dwell, beings whose existence was more 
 firmly rooted in the popular belief and language, 
 than that even the founder of a new religion could 
 have dared to reason them away. But, although 
 Buddha assigned to these mediatized gods and devils, 
 palaces, gardens, and a court, — not second to their 
 former ones, — he yet deprived them of all their sov- 
 ereign rights. Although, according to Buddha, the 
 worlds of the gods last for millions of years, they 
 must perish, at the end of every Kalpa, with the 
 gods and with the spirits who, in the circle of births, 
 have raised themselves to the world of the gods. 
 Indeed, the reorganization of the spirit world goes 
 further still. Already, before Buddha, the Brahmans 
 had surmounted the low standpoint of mythological 
 polytheism, and supplanting it by the idea of the 
 Brahman, as the absolute divine or super-divine 
 power. What, then, does Buddha decree ? To this 
 Brahman also he assigns a place in his universe. 
 Over and above the world of the gods with its six 
 paradises, he heaps up sixteen Brahma-worlds, not 
 
32 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 to be attained through virtue and piety only, but 
 through inner contemplation, through knowledge 
 and enlightenment. The dwellers in these worlds 
 are already purely spiritualized beings, without body, 
 without weight, without desire, far above men and 
 gods. Indeed, the Buddhist architect rises to a still 
 more towering height, heaping upon the Brahma 
 world four still higher worlds, which he calls the 
 world of the formless. All these worlds are open 
 to man, and the beings ascend and descend in the 
 circle of time, according to the works they have 
 performed, according to the truths they have recog- 
 nized. But in all these worlds the law of change 
 obtains ; in none is there exemption from birth, age 
 and death. The world of the gods will perish like 
 that of men, even the world of the formless will 
 not last forever ; but the Buddha, the Enlightened 
 and truly Free, stands higher and will not be 
 affected or disturbed by the collapse of the Universe : 
 ^Sifractus illabatur orhis^ imjpavidum ferient ruince,^ 
 " Now, however, we meet with a vein of irony, 
 which one would have hardly expected in Buddha. 
 Gods and devils he had located ; to all mythological 
 and philosophical acquisitions of the past he had 
 done justice as far as possible. Even fabulous be- 
 ings, such as Nagas, Gandharvas, and Garudas, had 
 escaped the process of dissolution which was to 
 reach them later only at the hands of comparative 
 mythology. There is only one idea, the idea of a 
 personal creator, in regard to which Buddha is re- 
 lentless. 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 33 
 
 " It is not only denied, but even its origin, like 
 that of an ancient myth, is carefully explained by 
 him in its minutest details." 
 
 So far Max Muller. 
 
 Buddha thought it not necessary to play the part 
 of a religious Don Quixote. He made no attempt to 
 fight the windmills of mythological deities whose 
 existence he knew to be doomed. But as soon as 
 confronted with a serious problem, he made no 
 attempt at evading it, but met it squarely, and gave 
 to his disciples his solution without equivocation. 
 
 In spite of the contrast that obtains between 
 Buddhism and Christianity in the formulation of 
 their doctrines about soul and God, we are struck 
 by the similarity of their ethical maxims. Both 
 Buddhism and Christianity have remained to a great 
 extent monkish religions, although neither Buddha 
 nor Christ favored a monkish conception of life. 
 Buddha said : " The layman and the hermit are the 
 same when only both have banished the thought of 
 self." * 
 
 Among the Buddhist sects of Japan there is one 
 by the name of Shinshiu, which justly has been 
 called the Buddhistic Protestantism. It is the most 
 progressive and at the same time the most nu- 
 merous sect of Japan. Their priests eat fish and 
 meat, and are allowed to marry, because they claim 
 that Buddha had refused to make any difference 
 
 * Sacred Books of the East, vol. xix. p. 182, ver. 1292 (Fo- 
 Sho-Hing-Tsan-King) and "The Gospel of Buddha," chap. 
 xviii. ver. 10. 
 3 
 
34 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 between priest and layman, that austerities are of 
 no avail, and that faith in Amita alone, in the infi- 
 nite light of Buddha, can set us in that state of mind 
 which ensures eternal salvation. Their opposition 
 to a monkish morality is unquestionably in conform- 
 ity with Buddha's simple teachings, the gist of 
 which is contained in what Buddhists call the four 
 noble truths and the eightfold path of righteousness. 
 The four noble truths and the eightfold path of 
 righteousness are reiterated again and again in the 
 sacred literature of Buddhism. In order to show 
 the spirit of Buddhism in its original purity, without 
 any admixture of our own interpretation, we here 
 present a few unabbreviated paragraphs as they 
 stand in Prof. Ehys Davids's translation of the 
 Buddhist Suttas.* 
 
 THE FOUNDATION OF THE KINGDOM OF KIGHTEOTJSNESS. f 
 
 Eeverence to the Blessed One, the Holy One, the 
 Fully Enlightened One. 
 
 Thus have I heard. The blessed One was staying 
 at Benares, at the hermitage called Migadaya. And 
 there the Blessed One addressed the company of the 
 five Bhikkhus, J and said : 
 
 * Sacred Books of the East, Vol. XI. pp. 146-150 and 150-154. 
 
 f The expressions "the kingdom of righteousness," "the 
 glorious doctrine,*' or "gospel," etc., sound like imitations of 
 Christian ideals, and yet those names are genuine Buddhistic 
 terms and unquestionably older than Christianity. 
 
 X Bhikkhus, monks. The monks here addressed are the five 
 mendicants who had waited on Gautama while he underwent 
 austerities, and before he had attained enlightenment. 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 36 
 
 " There are two extremes, O Bhikkhus, which the 
 man who has given up the world ought not to follow 
 — the habitual practice, on the one hand, of those 
 things whose attraction depends upon the passions, 
 and especially of sensuality — a low and pagan way 
 (of seeking satisfaction), unworthy, unprofitable, and 
 fit only for the worldly-minded — and the habitual 
 practice, on the other hand, of asceticism (or self- 
 mortification), which is painful, unworthy and un- 
 profitable. 
 
 "There is a middle path, O Bhikkhus, avoiding 
 these two extremes, discovered by the Tathagata * 
 — a path which opens the eyes, and bestows under- 
 standing, which leads to peace of mind, to the higher 
 wisdom, to full enlightenment, to Mrvana ! 
 
 " What is that middle path, O Bhikkhus, avoid- 
 ing these two extremes, discovered by the Tathagata 
 — that path which opens the eyes, and bestows un- 
 derstanding, which leads to peace of mind, to the 
 higher wisdom, to full enlightenment, to Mrvana ? 
 Yerily ! it is this noble eightfold path ; that is to 
 say: 
 
 " Eight views ; right aspirations ; right speech 
 
 * Tathdgata ; the usual epithet for Buddha, and is explained 
 as the Perfect One, or he who fulfils. Prof. Rhys Davids says 
 in a footnote : " It is interpreted by Buddhaghosa, in the 
 Samangala Vilasini to mean that he came to earth for the same 
 purpose, after having passed through the same training in 
 former births, as all the supposed former Buddhas ; and 
 that, when he had so come, all his actions corresponded to 
 theirs." 
 
36 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 right conduct ; right livelihood ; right effort ; right 
 mindfulness ; and right contemplation. 
 
 "This, O Bhikkhus, is that middle path, avoid- 
 ing these two extremes, discovered by the Tatha- 
 gata — that path which opens the eyes, and bestows 
 understanding, which leads to peace of mind, to 
 the higher wisdom, to full enlightenment, to Nir- 
 vana? 
 
 " Now, this, O Bhikkhus, is the noble truth con- 
 cerning suffering. 
 
 *' Birth is attended with pain, decay is painful, 
 disease is painful, death is painful. Union with the 
 unpleasant is painful, painful is separation from the 
 pleasant ; and any craving that is unsatisfied, that 
 too is painful. In brief, the five aggregates which 
 spring from attachment (the conditions of individ- 
 uality and their cause) * are painful. 
 
 " This, then, O Bhikkhus, is the noble truth con- 
 cerning suffering. 
 
 " Now this, O Bhikkhus, is the noble truth con- 
 cerning the origin of suffering. 
 
 " Yerily, it is that thirst (or craving), causing the 
 renewal of existence, accompanied by sensual delight, 
 seeking satisfaction now here, now there — that is to 
 say, the craving for the gratification of the passions, 
 
 * One might express the central thought of this First Noble 
 Truth in the language of the nineteenth century by saying 
 that pain results from existence as an individual. It is the 
 struggle to maintain one's individuality which produces pain 
 — a most pregnant and far-reaching suggestion. See for a 
 fuller exposition the Fortnightly Review for December, 
 1879.— Translator, 
 
THE ORIGIN OF BUDDHISM. 37 
 
 or the craving for (a future) life, or the craving for 
 success (in this present life).* 
 
 " This, then, O Bhikkhus, is the noble truth con- 
 cerning the origin of suffering. 
 
 '' Now this, O Bhikkhus, is the noble truth con- 
 cerning the destruction of suffering. 
 
 " Yerily, it is the destruction, in which no passion 
 remains, of this very thirst, the laying aside of, the 
 being free from, the harboring no longer of this 
 thirst. 
 
 " This, then, O Bhikkhus, is the noble truth con- 
 cerning the destruction of suffering. 
 
 " 'Now this, O Bhikkhus, is the noble truth con- 
 cerning the way which leads to the destruction of 
 sorrow. Yerily ! it is this noble eightfold path ; that 
 is to say : 
 
 " Right views ; right aspirations ; right speech ; 
 right conduct ; right livelihood ; right effort ; right 
 mindfulness ; and right contemplation. 
 
 " This, then, O Bhikkhus, is the noble truth con- 
 cerning the destruction of sorrow." 
 
 And when the royal chariot wheel of the truth 
 had thus been set rolling onwards by the Blessed 
 One, the gods of the earth gave forth a shout, say- 
 ing : 
 
 " In Benares, at the hermitage of the Migadaya, 
 the supreme wheel of the empire of Truth has been 
 
 * " The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of 
 life" correspond very exactly to the first and third of these, 
 and would be not inadequate renderings of all three. — Trans- 
 lator. 
 
88 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 set rolling by the Blessed One — that wheel which 
 not by any Samana or Brahman, not by any god, 
 not by any Brahma or Mara, not by any one in the 
 universe, can ever be turned back ! " 
 
 This is the essence of Buddha's doctrine. This is 
 the Dharma in which Buddhists take refuge. 
 
 This doctrine of the four noble truths and the 
 eightfold noble path of righteousness was taught by 
 Buddha with the powerful authority of his impressive 
 personality. He exemplified it in his personal con- 
 duct, and explained it in parables ; and the mustard- 
 seed of his noble religion has become a great tree, 
 under the branches of which the nations of Asia have 
 found a dwelling-place. 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 
 
 ORIGINAL DUALISM. 
 
 Buddhism originated, as all religions do, from 
 the desire to escape the transiency of life with its 
 incidental vicissitudes and to attain the permanent 
 and enduring bliss of an undisturbed existence where 
 there is no pain, no disease, no death, no incerti- 
 tudes of any kind. As soon as the prevalence of 
 suffering was recognized as an inalienable con- 
 dition of bodily existence the first attempt at 
 obtaining deliverance from evil was naturally made 
 by a mortification of the body for the sake of 
 benefiting the soul. The body was looked upon 
 as the source of all misery, and a purely spiritual 
 existence was the ideal in which religious men set 
 their hope of salvation. The body is doomed to die, 
 and was therefore considered as an animated corpse. 
 Our material existence is a body of death of which 
 man must rid himself before he can obtain the 
 deathless state. Thus we read in the story of 
 Sumedha, which serves as an introduction to the 
 Jatahas : 
 
 " Even as a man might rid him of 
 A horrid corpse bound to his neck, 
 And then upon his way proceed, 
 J070US, and free, and unconstrained ; 
 
40 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 " So must I likewise rid me of 
 This body foul, this charnel-house, 
 And go my way without a care, 
 Or least regret for things behind. 
 
 " As men and women rid them of 
 Their dung upon the refuse heap, 
 And go their ways without a care, 
 Or least regret for what they leave ; 
 
 *' So will I likewise rid me of 
 This body foul, this charnel-house, 
 And go my way as if I had 
 Cast out my filth into the draught. " * 
 
 Sumedha says : 
 
 *' What misery to be bom again I 
 And have the flesh dissolve at death ! 
 
 " Subject to birth, old age, disease, 
 Extinction will I seek to find. 
 Where no decay is ever known, 
 Nor death, but all security." t 
 
 The ideal of Buddhahood, accordingly, was in its 
 
 original shape the attainment of a purely spiritual 
 
 condition which it was hoped would afford a perfect 
 
 emancipation from suffering. It was the same 
 
 yearning as that of the early Christians, expressed 
 
 in St. Paul's words : 
 
 *' O wretched man that I am 1 who shall deliver me from 
 the body of this death ? " 
 
 * H. C. Warren, in his Buddhism in Translations, pp. 7-8. 
 See also the passage quoted from Chapter VI. of the Visuddhi- 
 Magga, p. 300. 
 
 t Ibid., p. 6. 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 41 
 
 Even Luther, with whom the monistic era of 
 Christianity begins, speaks of his body with the 
 utmost contempt. The term Madensaok^ i. e., a bag 
 full of food for grubs, is a favorite expression of his. 
 
 The religious problem, as it presented itself to 
 the ascetic Gautama before he had attained to 
 Buddhahood, was formulated on dualistic principles, 
 but his final solution rested upon a monistic basis. 
 We know little of his philosophical evolution and 
 the phases through which he passed ; but the out- 
 come is unequivocal in all important questions that 
 form decisive test-issues as to the character of his 
 system. He was tolerant and showed extreme pa- 
 tience with all kinds of mythologies, even utilizing 
 the superstitions of his age to the enhancement of 
 his religion, but he was merciless in his rejection of 
 metaphysicism and dualism. 
 
 ANTI-METAPHYSICAL. 
 
 After Buddha had surrendered the old dualism, 
 the traditional formulation of philosophical problems 
 lost their meaning ; they became what we now call 
 illegitimate questions; and whenever Buddha was 
 confronted with such illegitimate questions, he either 
 refused to answer them or declared openly : " The 
 question is not rightly put." * His refusal to answer 
 such questions, which on his plane of thought had 
 become unmeaning and irrelevant, nay, even mis- 
 
 * See, for instance, Warren, Buddhism in Translations^ 
 pp. 167 and 312. 
 
42 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN OHITICS. 
 
 leading, can be interpreted as agnosticism, or as a 
 dodge and attempt at straddling, only by those who 
 utterly misconceive the spirit of Buddha's doctrines. 
 When bored with questions by a wandering ascetic, 
 one of those frivolous wranglers who dispute merely 
 for the sake of discussion, Buddha refuses to answer, 
 but when afterwards Ananda accosts his master 
 he explains why the wandering ascetic received no 
 reply. The reason is here again the error involved 
 in the wrong formulation of the question. Thus if 
 he had replied in the negative, saying that the atman 
 does not survive death, the wandering ascetic would 
 have said " the Buddha teaches that there is no 
 after-life " ; and if he had replied in the affirmative, 
 saying that the atman survives death, the impKca- 
 tion would have been that Buddha believed with the 
 Yedanta philosophers in the existence of an atman. 
 Buddha's monism is not materialism ; he does not 
 identify soul and body, he only denies the separate 
 existence of soul-entities. There is soul and there is 
 body. There are consciousness-forms and bodily- 
 forms, and both are changing and developing, both 
 are subject to growth and decay. The body is dis- 
 solved, and consciousness passes away, yet their 
 forms reappear in new incarnations. There is death 
 and rebirth, and there is continuity of life with its 
 special and individual types. If the soul were iden- 
 tical with the body, it would perish with it ; if it 
 were a distinct entity and an immutable atman, it 
 would not be affected by conduct and there would 
 be no use in leading a holy life. In either case 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 43 
 
 there is no need of seeking religion. Buddha's solu- 
 tion is, that there are not two things (1) an atman 
 and (2) the deeds performed by the atman, but there 
 is one thing — a soul-activity (karma), which operates 
 by a continuous preservation of its deed-forms or 
 samskaras, which are the dispositions produced by 
 the various functions of karma. There is not a being 
 that is born, acts, enjoys itself, suffers and dies and 
 is reborn to die again ; but simply birth, action, en- 
 joyment, suffering, and death take place. The life- 
 activity, the deeds, the karma, the modes of motion 
 in all their peculiar forms, alone are real : they are 
 preserved and nothing else. Man's soul consists of 
 the memory-forms, or dispositions, produced by 
 former karmas. There is no self in itself, no separate 
 atman ; the self consists in the deed-forms, and every 
 creature is the result of deeds. 
 
 The disciples propose to the Blessed One in the 
 Samyutta-Wihdya this question : 
 
 " Reverend Sir, what are old age and death ? and what is it 
 has old age and death ? " 
 
 The Blessed One replies : 
 
 *' The question is not rightly put. O priest, to say : ' What 
 are old age and death ? and what is it has old age and death ? ' 
 and to say : ' Old age and death are one thing, but it is an- 
 other thing which has old age and death,' is to say the same 
 thing in different ways. 
 
 "If, O priest, the dogma obtain that the soul and the body 
 are identical, then there is no religious life ; or if, O priest, 
 the dogma obtain that the soul is one thing and the body an- 
 other, then also there is no religious life. Both these ex- 
 
44 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 tremes, O priest, have been avoided by the Tathagata, and it 
 is a middle doctrine he teaches : ' On birth depend old age and 
 death.' " (Buddhism in Translations, p. 167.) 
 
 PERSONALITY. 
 
 But considering the practical importance of per- 
 sonal effort in moral endeavor, how can the denial 
 of the existence of a separate self as the condition 
 of personality be useful in religion ? 
 
 The answer is, that the denial of the existence of 
 a separate self, an atman, is not a denial of the real 
 self such as it actually exists in man's personality. 
 There is no chariot in itself, but there are chariots ; 
 there are no persons in themselves, but there are 
 persons. Buddha does not intend to wipe out the 
 personality of man, but only the false notion of the 
 metaphysical character of personality. Not only 
 did Buddha always endeavor to adapt his teachings 
 to different personalities, but we find generally in 
 Buddhism as much stress laid upon the personal 
 relation of a disciple to the master, as by Luther, 
 who used to say that " it is not enough for a Chris- 
 tian to know that Jesus Christ is the Saviour, he 
 must experience the fact in his heart and must be 
 able to say, ' Jesus Christ has come to save me in- 
 dividually.' "* 
 
 There is a similar aspiration in Buddhism, which 
 
 * "Darum ist's nicht genug, dass einer glaubt, es sei Gott, 
 Christus habe gelitten., u. dergl., sondern er muss festiglich 
 glauben, dass Gott ihm zur Seligkeit ein Gott sei, dass Christus 
 fiir ihn gelitten habe, etc." (Quoted by Kiistlin in his Luther's 
 Theologie.) Similar passages are frequent in Luther's writ- 
 ings. 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 45 
 
 Buddhagosha, in his comments on the Dhammapada, 
 expresses as follows : 
 
 " Now when a Supreme Buddha teaches the Doctrine, those 
 in front and those behind, and those beyond a hundred or a 
 thousand worlds, and those even who inhabit the abode of the 
 Sublime Gods, exclaim : ' The Teacher is looking at me ; Tlie 
 Teacher is teaching the Doctrine to me.' To each one it seems 
 as if the Teacher were beholding and addressing him alone. 
 The Buddhas, they say, resemble the moon : as the moon in 
 the midst of the heavens appears to every living being as if 
 over his head, so the Buddhas appear to every one as if stand- 
 ing in front of him." {Buddhism in Translations, p. 470.) 
 
 Far from being an obliteration of individuality, 
 the denial of the atman actually involves a liberation 
 of individuality from an error that is liable to stunt 
 all mental growth and hinder man's free develop- 
 ment. Buddha takes out of life the vanity of self, 
 which is based upon the dualism of atman and 
 karma as separate realities. There is no need of 
 bothering about an atman, but it is important to be 
 mindful, thoughtful, and energetic in all that a man 
 undertakes and does, for the karma is the stuff of 
 which a man is made. One's own personal en- 
 deavor and achievements constitute one's personality, 
 and this personality is preserved beyond death, as 
 we read : 
 
 " But every deed a man performs 
 With body, or with voice, or mind, 
 'Tis this that he can call his own. 
 This with him take as he goes hence. 
 This is what follows after him 
 And like a shadow ne'er departs."* 
 
 * Buddhism in Translations, p. 228. 
 
46 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 These lines have reference to the parable of the 
 man whom his family, his friends, and his property 
 leave when he is cited before the judge, while his 
 good deeds alone follow him through the gate of 
 death and plead for him. Speaking Avithout allegory, 
 we ought to say that the deeds, or rather the deed- 
 forms, are the man himself. 
 
 There is no duality of a doer and his doings, a 
 thinker and his thoughts, an enjoyer and his en- 
 joyments, a sufferer and his sufferings, an aspirer 
 and his aspirations. There is not an atman that 
 performs karma ; but there is karma which, wherever 
 incarnated in an individual group, appears as an 
 atman. The words doer, agent, enjoj^er, etc., are 
 mere modes of speech. The realities of soul-life con- 
 sist in doings, thoughts, sufferings, enjoyments, and 
 aspirations. Actions take place, and the peculiar 
 form of every action is preserved as an analogous 
 disposition to repeat that same action in the shape 
 of memory-structures ; and all living beings start 
 life as the summed-up memory of their deeds in 
 former existences. 
 
 THE DEATHLESS. 
 
 There is no atman-soul ; accordingly there is no 
 transmigration of an atman-soul ; yet there is rebirth : 
 there is a reincarnation of the ancestral karma by a 
 preservation and reproduction of the soul-forms 
 transmitted from generation to generation. 
 
 Here we must make a distinction between pure 
 forms and materialized forms. By the pure form of 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 47 
 
 a right-angled triangle we mean the mathematical 
 conception in its abstract and absolute distinctness. 
 The relations of the angles and sides are definite 
 conditions of unalterable rigidity. They can be for- 
 mulated in theories which are readily recognized as 
 eternal verities. The materialist who believes that 
 material bodies alone are real, would say that pure 
 forms are non-existent, but the mathematician knows 
 that a right-angled triangle is a definite actuality 
 which, whenever an occasion arises, will manifest it- 
 self with unfailing exactness. Manifestations of 
 right-angled triangles take place in materialized 
 forms, by which we mean some single drawing made 
 in ink, pencil, or chalk, or a relation obtaining some- 
 how among three points represented by the centres 
 of stars or indicated by rays of light. The actualiza- 
 tion of a pure form may be more or less perfect, 
 but it always exemplifies the laws of pure form 
 and is, so to speak, its incarnation. In this sense 
 Plato speaks of ideas as being above time and 
 space, and Schiller sings of the higher realm of 
 pure forms : 
 
 " In den hoheren Regionen 
 Wo die reinen Formen wohnen." 
 
 For ethical considerations man must learn to 
 identify himself, not with the materialization of his 
 thought and aspirations, but with their forms ; for 
 the former are transient, the latter eternal. He 
 must let go all attachment to the special and partic- 
 ular embodiment in which his soul appears. He 
 must find his anchorage in that which cannot be 
 
48 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CBITICS. 
 
 destroyed but will last forever and aye. The pure 
 forms of his soul-being must be understood as pos- 
 sessing his body they shape his brain, the nervous 
 structures of his thoughts, the materialized forms of 
 his sentiments and aspirations ; they dominate his 
 life, his energies, his everything, but not vice versa : 
 his bodily incarnation does not lord it over the 
 eternal type Avhich in him becomes manifest. The 
 material elements do not possess the directing 
 faculty, for direction is a formal principle. 
 
 In this sense Christ existed since eternity as the 
 divine Logos and became flesh in Jesus ; and Buddha 
 descended from the Tusita Heaven to earth for the 
 purpose of being incarnated in the son of Maya. 
 In this same sense Buddhists speak of attaining to 
 the Bodhi, i. e. enlightenment or Buddhahood, which 
 implies that the Bodhi existed before Gautama found 
 it. In the same sense, the right-angled triangle and 
 its law existed before Pythagoras ; he did not invent 
 the theorem that bears his name : he discovered it. 
 The idea of a right-angled triangle with all its 
 essential relations dawned upon him, became incar- 
 nated in him, manifested itself in him. 
 
 But here we must pause a moment, for here lies a 
 difficulty which has greatly embarrassed the trans- 
 lators of Buddhist scriptures. The Pali word rupa 
 means "form," but it is frequently used in the 
 sense of materialized form {rupa lcayo\ not in the 
 sense of pure form ; indeed, it must sometimes be 
 translated by body. Thus that which Plato and 
 Schiller would call pure form is in Pali called 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 49 
 
 arujpo^^ " that which is without rujpa^ the bodiless," 
 commonly translated " the formless." 
 
 We read in the Buddhist scriptures that the 
 attainment of Nirvana is not possible unless we 
 comprehend " the formless," which is the unmaterial, 
 the eternal, the deathless. This deathless, this un- 
 material, this "formless," or rather this eternal 
 realm of pure form the arupaloco is not an essence, 
 not an entity, not an individual being or a personal 
 deity ; it has no special dwelling, nor is it a locality, 
 or a heavenly abode ; and yet it is the most im- 
 portant truth to be known. 
 
 " There is, O disciples, something not-bom, not-originated, 
 not-made, not-formed. If, O disciples, there were not this 
 not-born, not-originated, not-made, not-formed, there would 
 be no escape for the born, the originated, the made, the 
 formed." Udana, VIII., 3. 
 
 The deathless is a mere nothing, if "nothing" 
 means absence of materiality, and yet it is the most 
 important factor of life, for it makes enlightenment 
 possible and is the condition of salvation. In the 
 Majjhima NiMya (Sutta 26), in which Buddha de- 
 clares that "the deathless has been gained," the 
 theory is set forth that the " Nothing " is not a 
 nonentity, but that it exists ; and " of the priests 
 who dwells in the realm of nothingness " it is said 
 that " he has blinded Mara, made useless the eye of 
 Mara, gone out of sight of the Wicked One." 
 
 * Also spelt aruppo and artipe. The neuter of ariipo (arupam) 
 is used as a synonym of Nirvdna. 
 4 
 
50 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 He who clings to bodily form, i. e., the material- 
 ized incarnation of pure form, and identifies his self 
 with this compound of atoms, this aggregation of 
 material elements, is not free from the illusion of 
 selfhood ; he has not found the eternal resting-place 
 of life ; the bliss of ]N'irvana, the peace of his soul ; 
 he is driven round in a whirl of eternal turmoil, in 
 the samsara of worldly interests, in aspirations for 
 transient goods. 
 
 He who has attained arupam, the formless, sur- 
 renders with it all petulancy of self, for jealousy, 
 spite, hatred, pride, envy, concupiscence, vainglory 
 — all these and kindred ambitions — have lost their 
 sense. He is energetic, but without passion ; he 
 aspires, but does not cling ; he administers, but does 
 not regard himself an owner ; he acquires, but does 
 not covet. This is expressed in the Milindapanha^ 
 where we read : 
 
 "Said the king, 'Bhante Nagasena, what is the difference 
 between one who has passion and one who is free from pas- 
 sion?' 
 
 " ' Your majesty, the one clings, the other does not cling.' 
 " ' Bhante, what do you mean by ** clings " and " does not 
 cling"?' 
 
 *' ' Your majesty, the one covets, the other does not covet.* 
 
 " * Bhante, this is the way I look at the matter : both he 
 
 who has passion and he who is free from passion have the 
 
 same wisli, that his food, whether hard or soft, should be 
 
 good ; neither wishes for what is bad.* 
 
 *' ' Your majesty, he that is not free from passion experiences 
 
 * Quoted from Henry Clarke Warren, Buddhism in Transla- 
 tions, p. 431. See also Sacred Books of the East, XXXV., p. 
 
 Ilt7. 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 51 
 
 both the taste of that food, and also passion due to that taste, 
 while he who is free from passion experiences the taste of 
 that food, but no passion due to that taste.' " 
 
 THE MIDDLE DOCTRINE. 
 
 Buddha calls his solution of the psychological 
 problem the middle doctrine, because it ayoids both 
 extremes of what, in the terms of the schoolmen, 
 may be called extreme Eealism and extreme Nomi- 
 nalism. Buddha denies that there are things in 
 themselves of any kind. Compounds have no exist- 
 ence outside their parts, and man, like other things, 
 animals, plants, chariots, worlds, etc., is a compound. 
 There is no self in man as a separate entity. Self 
 denotes the whole man. He who says compounds 
 are things in themselves is mistaken, but he who 
 denies the existence of compounds, he who proclaims 
 the doctrine of non-existence is mistaken also. 
 Compounds are real enough, the relation among 
 things and their interaction are not mere illusions. 
 While there are no things in themselves, there are 
 forms in themselves. Buddhagosha argues in the 
 Yisudhi-Magga, Chap. XYIII. : 
 
 " Just as the word ' chariot' is but a mode of expression for 
 axle, wheels, chariot-body, pole, and otlier constituent mem- 
 bers, placed in a certain relation to each other, but when we 
 come to examine the members one by one, we discover that 
 in the absolute sense there is no chariot ; and just as the woid 
 ' house ' is but a mode of expression for wood and other con- 
 stituents of a house, surrounding space in a certain relation, 
 but in the absolute sense there is no house ; and just as the 
 word ' fist ' is but a mode of expression for the fingers, the 
 thumb, etc. , in a certain relation ; and the word ' lute ' for the 
 
52 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 body of the lute, strings, etc., 'army' for elephants, horses, 
 etc. ; 'city' for fortifications , houses, gates, etc. ; 'tree' fo 
 trunk, branches, foliage, etc., in a certain relation, but when 
 we come to examine the parts one by one, we discover that in 
 the absolute sense there is no tree ; in exactly the same way 
 the words ' living entity ' and ' atman ' are but a mode of ex- 
 pression for the presence of the five attachment groups, but 
 when we come to examine the elements of being one by one, 
 we discover that in the absolute sense there is no living entity 
 there to form a basis for such figments as * I am ' or ' I ' ; in 
 other words, that in the absolute sense there is only name and 
 form. The insight of him who perceives this is called knowl- 
 edge of the truth." {Ibid., p. 133.) 
 
 As soon as we abandon the middle doctrine and 
 assume the existence of a self which is supposed to 
 be an entity that is in possession of all the parts of 
 a compound, we must either assume that this entity 
 after the dissolution of its parts will persist or that 
 it will perish ; and both views are erroneous because 
 they start from a wrong premise. He who imagines 
 that his self is immortal is mistaken and will cherish 
 foolish ideas as to the mode and place of its future 
 residence. But he who thinks that his self will 
 perish is not less mistaken ; he is unnecessarily 
 afraid of death, for there is no self that can perish. 
 Both propositions are senseless, because based on 
 the illusions of either an extreme realism or an ex- 
 treme nominalism. 
 
 He who sees things as they really are ceases to 
 cleave to existence ; he does not think that sensation 
 or thought or any one of the aggregates is the 
 atman, but for that reason his personality is not 
 wiped out. 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 53 
 
 •* He ceases to attach himself to anything in the world, and 
 being free from attachment, he is never agitated, and being 
 never agitated, he attains to Nirvana in his own person." 
 (L. c. p. 137.) 
 
 NOT A DOCTRINE OF ANNIHILATION. 
 
 If man is " name and form " and no self in itself, 
 the proposition seems to suggest itself that death 
 ends all; but the doctrine of annihilation is not 
 countenanced by any of the orthodox Buddhists. 
 We read in the Samyutta Nihaya (XXII., 85) : 
 
 *' Now at that time the following wicked heresy had sprung 
 up in the mind of a priest named Yamaka : ' Thus do I under- 
 stand the doctrine taught by the Blessed One, that on the dis- 
 solution of the body the priest who has lost all depravity is 
 annihilated, perishes, and does not exist after death.' " (i. c, 
 p. 138.) 
 
 And a number of priests who had heard the re- 
 port drew near and said : 
 
 " Say not so, brother Yamaka. Do not traduce the Blessed 
 One ; for it is not well to traduce the Blessed One. The Bless- 
 ed One would never say that on the dissolution of the body 
 the saint who has lost all depravity is annihilated, perishes, 
 and does not exist after death." (Ibid.) 
 
 Then Shariputra instructs Yamaka by teaching 
 him that there is no such a being as a saint or a 
 man in himself, for all his constituents are trans- 
 itory and cannot be regarded as his atman or 
 enduring self ; the saint is not bodily form, not sen- 
 sation, not perception, not any of the predisposi- 
 tions, not consciousness. How then can the saint be 
 annihilated in death? All the constituents of the 
 saint depend upon causation, but holiness and en- 
 
54 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 liglitenment are the deathless state which is not 
 touched by death. The Yisuddhi-Magga comprises 
 this doctrine in these four lines, which sound almost 
 paradoxical : 
 
 '* Misery only doth exist, none miserable. 
 No doer is there ; naught save the deed is found. 
 Nirvana is, but not the man who seeks it. 
 The Path exists, but not the traveller on it." * 
 
 And is ^N^irvana non-existence ? ]S[ot at all. It is 
 the attainment of the deathless state, of immaterial- 
 ity, of pure form of eternal verity, of the immutable 
 and enduring, where there is neither birth nor death, 
 neither disease nor old age, neither affliction nor 
 misery, neither temptation nor sin. 
 
 "'Wherein does Nirvana consist?' And to him, whose 
 mind was already averse to passion, the answer came : ' When 
 the fire of lust is extinct, that is Nirvana ; when the fires of 
 hatred and infatuation are extinct, that is Nirvana; when 
 pride, false belief, and all other passions and torments are ex- 
 tinct, that is Nirvana.'" {L. c, p. 59.) 
 
 He who attains Nirvana continues to exist in his 
 personal identity as pure form of a definite char- 
 acter, but he is without any trace of clinging to a 
 particular incarnation. Thus he is no longer reincar- 
 nated in any special individual, and this is the sense 
 in which Buddha has passed away and yet continues 
 to exist in his bodiless personality, as we read in the 
 Milindapanha f : 
 
 '• The king said : * Is there such a person as the Buddha, 
 Nagasena ? ' 
 
 *See Sacred Books of the East, XXXV., pp. 113-114. 
 \L. c.,p. 146. 
 
a?H^ PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 55 
 
 "'Yes.' 
 
 " ' Can he then, Ndgasena, be pointed out as being here and 
 there?' 
 
 *' ' The Blessed One, O king, has passed away by that kind 
 of passing away in which nothing remains which could tend 
 to the formation of another individual. It is not possible to 
 point out the Blessed One as being here or there.' " 
 
 THE CONQUEST OF DEATH. 
 
 The surrender of the self-illusion with its preten- 
 sions brings us practically to the same maxim of life 
 which St. Paul sets forth in 1 Cor., vii., 29-30 : 
 
 " But this I say, brethren, the time is short : it remaineth, 
 that both they that have wives be as though they had none. 
 
 " And they that weep, as though they w^ept not ; and they 
 that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not ; and they that buy, 
 as though they possessed not." 
 
 This view does not lead to the neglect of the 
 body, but to its being subservient to higher ends 
 and a nobler cause. The Buddha compares the 
 body to a wound which we nurse although we do 
 not love it. Kagasena says : 
 
 "They who have retired from the world take care of their 
 bodies as though they were wounds, without thereby becom- 
 ing attached to them." (Buddhism in Translations, p. 423. 
 Compare Sacred Books of the East, XXXV., p. 115.) 
 
 All vicissitudes and afflictions affect the bodily in- 
 carnation, not the eternal soul, the pure form or the 
 arupam, or bodiless, i. e., that which is without rupa ; 
 and thus the Samyutta IS'ickaya declares that the 
 saint may be " wretched of body " but can never be 
 
66 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 " wretched of mind." The actuality of the world, 
 the material reality of existence, the samsara is ab- 
 solutely void of permanency. All is transient and 
 nothing endures. Therefore he who sets his heart 
 on anything of the world or its various realizations 
 of form, is sure to suffer ; while he who has under- 
 stood the emptiness of all material existence seeks 
 refuge in Nirvana, the domain of eternal verities 
 which, in comparison to bodily realizations, (Con- 
 stitute the Yoid, the Nothing, the existence-less. 
 The eternal verities are immanent in all reality and 
 condition its evolution ; they are the aim and pur- 
 pose of life ; they are, to use Goethe's words, " the 
 unattainable of which all actual things are but sym- 
 bols." They are the nothingness of which we read 
 in the Majjhima Nihdya (Sutta 26), that he Avho 
 dwells in it is " out of the reach of Mara," the Evil 
 One. 
 
 " He has blinded Mara, made iiseless the eye of Mara, gone 
 out of sight of the Wicked One. " ( J6. , p. 348. ) 
 
 An ancient Pali verse (preserved in the Uddnay 
 lY., 4) characterizes this condition as follows : 
 
 ** The man whose mind, like to a rock. 
 Unmoved stands, and shaketh not ; 
 Which no delights can e'er inflame, 
 Or provocations rouse to wrath — 
 O, whence can trouble come to him, 
 Who thus hath nobly trained his mind ? " * 
 
 The belief in self, a separate soul-entity or atman, 
 is the most serious obstacle to the attainment of the 
 
 * Buddhism in Translations, p. 315. 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 57 
 
 eternal and deathless, because the thought of self 
 infuses all creatures with fear of dissolution as well 
 as a desire for this particular and special copy of its 
 own eternal being. The Visudhi-Magga (the Book 
 on the Path of Purity) dwells on the subject in 
 Chapter XXI., where we read : 
 
 *' To one who considers them [the constituents of being] in 
 the light of their transitoriness, the constituents of being seem 
 'perishable. To one who considers them in the light of their 
 misery, they seem frightful. To one who considers them in 
 the light of their want of an Ego, they seem empty. 
 
 *' He who considers them [the constituents of being] in the 
 light of their transitoriness abounds in faith and obtains the 
 unconditioned deliverance ; he who considers them in the light 
 of their misery, abounds in tranquillity and obtains the desire- 
 less deliverance ; he who considers them in the light of their 
 want of an Ego, abounds in knowledge and obtains the empty 
 deUverance." (16., p. 379.) 
 
 This is said to explain the stanza : 
 
 *' Behold how empty is the world, 
 Mogharaja ! In thoughtfulness 
 Let one remove belief in self 
 And pass beyond the realm of death. 
 The king of death can never find 
 The man who thus the world beholds." * 
 
 MODERN PSYCHOLOGY. 
 
 The world has been greatly astonished in these 
 latter years by the results reached by modern psycho- 
 logists, Herbart, Fechner, Weber, "Wundt, Ribot, 
 etc., who have arrived at the conclusion that there 
 is no soul-being, a theory which received the paradox- 
 ical name of " a psychology without a soul." The 
 * lb. p. 376. 
 
68 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CHITICS. 
 
 name is misleading, for the truth is that modern 
 psychology discards the metaphysical conception of 
 the soul only, not the soul itself. The unity of the 
 soul has ceased to be a monad, an atomistic unity, 
 and is recognized as a unification. The personality 
 of a man is a peculiar idiosyncrasy of psychic forms, 
 a system of sensations, impulses, and motor ideas, 
 but it is not a monad, not a distinct entity, not a 
 separate unit. In a word, there is no soul-entit}^, or 
 soul-substance, or soul-substratum, that is possessed 
 of sensations, impulses, and motor ideas ; but all the 
 sensations, impulses, and motor ideas of a man are 
 themselves part and parcel of his soul. Mr. Hegeler 
 expresses it by saying : " I have not ideas, but I am 
 ideas." 
 
 The modern theory of the soul is not quite new, 
 for it was clearly outlined by Kant, who counted the 
 notion of a distinct ego-soul as a contradiction, or, 
 as he termed it, one of the paralogism of pure rea- 
 son. He did not exactly deny the separate existence 
 of an ego, by which he understands apperception as 
 a unit, viz., self-consciousness, but he proved the in- 
 consistency of the assumption and retained the 
 notion only on practical grounds, because he argued 
 that the ego-conception is an idea without Avhich 
 ethics would fall to the ground. Theoretically he 
 rejected the existence of an ego-soul, but for the 
 sake of morality he retained it as a postulate of 
 practical reason. 
 
 The ego-soul is nothing but the ancient and famed 
 thing-in-itself in the province of psychology. Met- 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 59 
 
 aphysicians of the old school believe that philoso- 
 phy consists in the search for the thing-in-itself, 
 while the new positivist abandons the idea that 
 there is a separate entity behind or within the parts 
 of things. There is no watch-in-itself ; but a pecul- 
 iar combination of wheels and other mechanical 
 contrivances, together with a dial and the movable 
 hands on the dial, is called a watch. This is as little 
 denial of the existence of watches as the new psy- 
 chology is a psychology without a soul. Yet the 
 enemies of the new positivism will still insist that 
 the denial of things-in-themselves implies a philo- 
 sophical nihilism. 
 
 But the new psychology is still older than Kant. 
 As the doctrine of a separate soul prevailed in India 
 among the Brahmans, so the denial of the existence 
 of a separate soul was pronounced more than two 
 thousand years ago by that school of thought which 
 under the leadership of the great Siiakyarauni grew 
 up in opposition to Brahmanism and became known 
 by the name of Buddhism. I^ot only are the sim- 
 ilarities that obtain between modern psychology and 
 Buddhism striking, but we meet also with the same 
 misconceptions and objections. The denial of the 
 existence of a soul-entity is supposed to be a denial 
 of the soul and also of its immortality or its reincar- 
 nation. 
 
 PROFESSOR OLDENBERg's VIEW. 
 
 Among the expounders of Buddhism Professor 
 Oldenberg of Kiel ranks high. There are others 
 that are his equal, but there is perhaps none who is 
 
60 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHKISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 his superior in scholarship. But with all his philolo- 
 gical knowledge, the learned Professor is sadly de- 
 ficient in philosophical comprehension. He appears 
 absolutely unable to grasp the significance of the 
 Buddhistic soul-conception, and since his book on 
 Buddha has become a great authority, in Germany 
 almost the sole authority, from which our reading 
 public take their opinions on Buddhism ready-made, 
 his misconceptions have become instilled into the 
 minds of European and American thinkers, and it 
 will be worth while to point out the deficiencies of 
 his propositions. 
 
 H. Dharmapala, the secretary of the Maha-Badhi 
 Society and editor of the Maha-Bhadi Journal, the 
 official delegate of Cey lonese Buddhism to the Chicago 
 Parliament of Eeligions, wrote sorrowfully to me 
 two years ago : 
 
 I 
 
 *' Professor Oldenberg, the erudite scholar, has not grasped 
 the spirit of the Dharma. He has translated carefully the 
 Pali words, — and that is all. A philologist may dissect the 
 root of a Pali word, but it does not make him know the spirit 
 of Buddhism." 
 
 I have greatly profited by Professor Oldenberg's 
 researches, which, considered as philological lucu- 
 brations, are very valuable, but I have, after all, felt 
 constrained to adopt Mr. Dharmapala's opinion. I 
 have done so, however, not without hesitation, and 
 not without having previously tried to reach a sat- 
 isfactory explanation of his position. I shall here 
 briefly call attention to his presentation of the Bud- 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 61 
 
 dhist soul-conception and then point out the fallacies 
 of his views. Professor Oldenberg says in the 
 chapter entitled " The Soul : " 
 
 "It is not incorrect to say that Buddhism denies the exist- 
 ence of soul, but this must not be understood in a sense which 
 would in any way give this thought a materialistic stamp. It 
 might be said with equal propriety that Buddhism denies the 
 existence of the body. The body, and in the same sense the 
 soul also, does not exist as distinct and self-sustaining sub- 
 stances, but only as a complex of manifold inter-connected 
 processes of origination and decease. Sensations, perceptions, 
 and all those processes which make up the inner life, crowd 
 upon one another in motley variety ; in the centre of this 
 changing plurality stands consciousness (vinnana), wliich, if 
 the body be compared to a state, may be spoken of as the ruler 
 of this state."* But consciousness is not essentially different 
 from perceptions and sensations, the comings and goings of 
 which it at the same time superintends and regulates ; it is 
 also a Sankhara, and like all other Sankharas, it is changeable 
 and without substance." 
 
 Professor Oldenberg adds : 
 
 "We must here divest ourselves wholly of all customary 
 modes of thinking. We are accustomed to realize our inner 
 life as a comprehensible factor, only when we are allowed to 
 refer its changing ingredients, every individual feeling, every 
 distinct act of the will, to one and the same identical ego, but 
 
 ***The following passage is often repeated in the sacred 
 texts (e.g. , in the * Samannaphala Sutta ') : ' This is my body, 
 the material, framed out of the four elements, begotten by 
 my father and mother .... but that is my conscious- 
 ness, which clings firmly thereto, is joined to it. Like a 
 precious stone, beautiful and valuable, octahedral, well pol- 
 ished, clear and pure, adorned with all perfection, to which a 
 string is attached, blue or yellow, red or white, or a yellowish 
 band." 
 
62 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 this mode of thinking is fundamentally opposed to Buddhism. 
 Here as everywhere it condemns that fixity which we are 
 prone to give to the current of incidents that come and go by 
 conceiving a substance, to or in which they might happen. 
 A seeing, a hearing, a conceiving, above all a suffering, takes 
 place : but an existence, which may be regarded as the seer, 
 the hearer, the sufferer, is not recognized in Buddhist teach- 
 ing." {Buddha. By Dr. Hermann Oldenberg. English Trans- 
 lation, p. 253.) 
 
 This is exactly the same as in modern psychology. 
 The assumption of a soul-substance has been found 
 to be a perfectly redundant hypothesis. The soul of 
 man with all its various structures, or, as Buddhists 
 would say, " sankharas," is now conceived as a pro- 
 duct of evolution. Life develops the various sense- 
 organs in response to the stimuli of the surrounding 
 world. The function of seeing which is a reaction 
 taking place in response to the impact of the ether- 
 waves of light, results in the appearanceof eyes, the 
 function of hearing being a reaction in response to 
 the impact of the air-waves of sound, produces the 
 ear, and the interaction among the senses begets 
 thoughts. The translator of Oldenberg's book, Mr. 
 "William Hoey, is not happy in his selection of words, 
 for he says in the passage quoted : 
 
 " Sensations, perceptions, and all the processes which make 
 up the inner life, crowd upon one another in motley variety." 
 
 Where Oldenberg speaks of ineinanderstromen 
 (streaming one into the other), the expression " mot- 
 ley variety " is a redundant addition, and conveys 
 the idea that Buddhistic philosophy regards the soul 
 as a motley crowd of processes. Oldenberg perused 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 63 
 
 the manuscript before it went to press, and it is 
 probable that he took no offence at the expression ; 
 indeed the context appears to justify the translator. 
 "We would not hold Oldenberg responsible for mis- 
 translations, but English readers know him through 
 the translation only, and for their benefit we feel 
 urged to add a few words in explanation. 
 
 Far from regarding the inter-relations of thoughts 
 and sensations as a chance conglomeration, Nagasena, 
 the famous expositor of Buddhistic philosophy, makes 
 the very opposite statement which in spite of its 
 importance, is nowhere mentioned in Professor 
 Olden berg's work on Buddha. 
 
 We read in the Milindapanha : 
 
 **It is by a process of evolution that the soul-structures 
 (sankharas) come to be." 
 
 And this statement is inculcated again and again, 
 not less than seven times — a strange anticipation of 
 the evolution theory ! And then we read that these 
 soul-faculties that originate through evolution " are 
 not combined indiscriminately " (I. 6, Sacred Boohs 
 of the East, XXXY., p. 87). " First is sight and then 
 thought," for "all that happens happens through 
 natural slope " (p. 90) " because of habit " (pp. 89 
 and 91) and " on account of an association " (p. 89). 
 In the same sense modern psychologists speak of the 
 " path of least resistance," and the principle of asso- 
 ciation is so highly appreciated that the English 
 school calls its doctrine the " psychology of asso- 
 ciation." There is certainly no justification for such 
 
64 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CKITICS. 
 
 a terra as " motley variety " in characterizing Bud- 
 dhist psychology. On the contrary, we should be 
 astonished at the anticipations of the most modern 
 ideas. 
 
 Those who are accustomed to refer all psychic 
 activity to one and the same identical ego, must, as 
 Professor Oldenberg says, divest themselves of their 
 customary modes of thinking ; and he tries hard to 
 do so himself, but he does not succeed. 
 
 The new psychology is, in fact, as much simpler 
 than the old one as the Coper nican system is simpler 
 than the Ptolemaic system, but in order to appreciate 
 this truth we must be acquainted with the facts. 
 The geocentric astronomy appears natural to him 
 who believes that there is an upside and a down, not 
 only on earth, but also in the heavens ; and the 
 egocentric psychology is that childlike soul-con- 
 ception which knows nothing of evolution, but as- 
 sumes that a stork or other messenger brings into 
 the world at the moment of birth a soul, we do not 
 know whence, which soul is made the lord of the new- 
 born baby with all his inherited tendencies. A 
 certain amount of knowledge is necessary to com- 
 prehend the new views in both sciences, but he who 
 has outgrown his mental swaddling clothes will not 
 fail to abandon both the geocentric view in astronomy 
 and the egocentric view in psychology. 
 
 vacchagotta's question. 
 
 Professor Oldenberg believes that not only the 
 negation of the ego but also the negation of an 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 65 
 
 eternal future must be regarded as the correct solu- 
 tion of the Buddhistic dialectic, and he claims that 
 this was not openly pronounced by the Buddha be- 
 cause he feared to shock the hearts that quailed be- 
 fore the nothing. And yet Oldenberg quotes at the 
 same time the passage of the Samyuttaka NiMya 
 in which the doctrine of annihilation is squarely de- 
 nounced as a heresy. We read : 
 
 '* ' At this time a monk named Yamaka had adopted the 
 following heretical notion: "I understand the doctrine 
 taught by the Exalted One to be this, that a monk who is free 
 from sin, when his body dissolves, is subject to annihilation, 
 that he passes away, that he does not exist beyond death." '" 
 (Oldenberg, Buddha, Engl, ed., p. 281.) 
 
 When Sariputta convinces Yamaka that he does 
 not even in this world appreciate the Perfect One, 
 the monk confesses his error and he says : 
 
 " • Such, indeed, was hitherto, friend Sariputta, the heretical 
 view which I ignorantly entertained. But now when I hear 
 the venerable Sariputta expound the doctrine, the heretical 
 view has lost its hold of me, and I have learned the doc- 
 trine."" (76., p. 282.) 
 
 In spite of innumerable passages which prove 
 that Nirvana is not annihilation, Oldenberg declares 
 that " the doctrine that there is no ego is equivalent 
 to the proposition: The Mrvana is annihilation." 
 Professor Oldenberg adds : 
 
 "But we can well understand why these thinkers, who were 
 
 in a position to realize this ultimate consequence and to bear 
 
 it, abandoned the erection of it as an official dogma of the 
 
 Buddhist order. There were enough, and more than enough 
 
 5 
 
66 BUDDHI&M AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 of hopes and wishes, from which he who desired to follow the 
 Sakya's son, had to sever his heart. Why present to the weak 
 the keen edge of the truth ; the victor's prize of the delivered 
 is the Nothing ? True, it is not permissible to put falsehood 
 in the place of truth, but it is allowable to draw a well-meant 
 veil over the picture of the truth, the sight of which threatens 
 the destruction of the unprepared. What harm did it do ? 
 That which was alone of intrinsic worth and essential to excite 
 the struggle for deliverance was maintained in unimpaired 
 force, the certainty that deliverance is to be found only where 
 joys and sorrows of this world have ceased. Was the eman- 
 cipation of him, who knew how to free himself from every- 
 thing transitory, not perfect enough ? Would it become more 
 perfect, if he were driven to acknowledge that beside the 
 transitory there is only the Nothing ? " (lb. , 273, 274. ) 
 
 Buddha, it is true, limited himself to that which 
 conduces to deliverance, holiness, peace, and en- 
 lightenment, and gave no answer to questioners who 
 were not prepared to understand his doctrine. 
 Thus Oldenberg quotes the following passage from 
 the Ba/myuUaka Nihdya : 
 
 ** * Then the wandering monk* Vacchagotta went to where 
 the Exalted One was staying. When he had come near him 
 he saluted him. When, saluting him, he had interchanged 
 friendly words with him, he sat down beside him. Sitting 
 beside him the wandering monk Vacchagotta spake to the 
 Exalted One, saying : " How does the matter stand, venerable 
 Gotama, is there the ego (atta) ? " ' 
 
 "When he said this, the Exalted One was silent. 
 
 " ' How, then, venerable Gotama, is there not the ego ? * 
 
 "*A monk of a non-Buddhistic sect. The dialogue here 
 translated is to be found in the ^amynttdka Nikdya, Vol. II., 
 fol. tan. 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 67 
 
 " And still the Exalted One maintained silence. Then the 
 wandering monk Vacchagotta rose from his seat and went 
 away. 
 
 "But the venerable Ananda, when the wandering monk 
 Vacchagotta had gone to a distance, soon said to the Exalted 
 One : ' Wherefore, sire, has the Exalted One not given an 
 answer to the questions put by the wandering monk Vaccha- 
 gotta ? ' 
 
 " 'If I, Ananda, when the wandering monk Vacchagotta 
 asked me : " Is there the ego ? " had answered : " The ego is," 
 then that, Ananda, would have confirmed the doctrine of the 
 Samanas and Brahraanas who believe in permanence. If I, 
 Ananda, when the wandering monk Vacchagotta asked me : 
 "Is there not the ego?" had answered : " The ego is not," 
 then that, Ananda, would have confirmed the doctrine of the 
 Samanas and Brahmanas, who believe in annihilation. If I, 
 Ananda, when the wandering monk Vacchagotta asked me : 
 " Is there the ego ? " had answered : " The ego is," would that 
 have served my end, Ananda, by producing in him the knowl- 
 edge : all existences (dhamma) are non-ego ? ' 
 
 " ' That it would not, sire.' 
 
 " * But if I, Ananda, when the wandering monk Vaccha- 
 gotta asked me: "Is there not the ego?" had answered: 
 " The ego is not," then that, Ananda, would only have caused 
 the wandering monk Vacchagotta to be thrown from one 
 bewilderment into another : " My ego, did it not exist before ? 
 but now it exists no longer." ' " 
 
 Oldenberg's interpretation of this passage is as 
 follows ; 
 
 "We see : the person who has framed this dialogue has in 
 his thought very nearly approached the consequence which 
 leads to the negation of the ego. It may almost be said that, 
 though probably he did not wish to express this consequence 
 with overt consciousness, yet he has in fact expressed it. If 
 Buddha avoids the negation of the existence of the ego, he 
 does so in order not to shock a weak-minded hearer," 
 (26., 272, 273.) 
 
bo BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Any one who understands the doctrine of modern 
 psychology will appreciate Buddha's silence, which 
 is amply explained by Buddha's words. Buddha 
 refuses to answer the questions of Yacchagotta, but 
 he gives a satisfactory explanation to Ananda. 
 
 It appears that Yacchagotta was a man who ex- 
 hibited hopeless confusion concerning the funda- 
 mental notions of the Buddhist psychology. Bud- 
 dha, it is true, denied the existence of an ego-soul ; 
 he denied that that something in man which says 
 " I " can be regarded as a metaphysical soul-princi- 
 ple lording over all the faculties of man ; but 
 Buddha does not deny the reality of man's actual 
 soul, his sensations and motor ideas; he does not 
 deny the presence of consciousness, nor that there 
 is a psychic structure in him that says " I." On the 
 other hand, he does not teach that the soul of man 
 (his sankharas) will be annihilated in death. He 
 teaches reincarnation, man's soul-structures will re- 
 appear, or rather they continue to exist after death. 
 They are impressed upon others, and there is no 
 annihilation ; they are preserved exactly in the way 
 in which they manifested themselves. Thus Yac- 
 chagotta' s question could not be answered with a 
 straightforward Yes or No. A simple Yes or 'No 
 would under all conditions simply have increased 
 the questioner's confusion. The question could be 
 answered only after a discussion and complete ex- 
 planation of the meaning of the term ego, which for 
 reasons not mentioned in the dialogue the Buddha 
 did not see fit to make. Probably he deemed it a 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 69 
 
 waste of time to have a controversy with a profes- 
 sional controversialist and therefore refused to 
 accept his challenge. 
 
 Suppose a carpenter's apprentice without educa- 
 tion who understood nothing of mathematics, had 
 approached the late Professor Gauss of Gottingen 
 and asked him : " I understand that the Professor 
 denies the reality of circles and lines, that he declares 
 they are purely mental, ideal products of imagina- 
 tion, and quite unsubstantial ? Will not the learned 
 Professor answer ray question squarely and in a 
 straightforward manner, without reserve and with- 
 out shirking the issue, Is mathematics substantial 
 or is it not substantial ? " What would Professor 
 Gauss have said? Had he said, "mathematical 
 figures are substantial," the apprentice would have 
 acquired an erroneous notion regarding the nature 
 of mathematics ; but had the Professor said, " Math- 
 ematics are unsubstantial and purely ideal," the 
 young fellow would have thought that mathemati- 
 cal constructions were arbitrary and imaginary like 
 dreams. Professor Gauss would probably not have 
 answered the question at all, for Avhatever he might 
 have said, it would have been bewildering to the 
 questioner. Now, should we say, on reading the 
 report of such an interview, that Professor Gauss 
 had practically taught the non-existence of mathe- 
 matics ? And could we presume that we understood 
 why he avoided to draw the last conclusion of his 
 doctrine ; namely, for the reason that he did not 
 want to shock a weak-minded hearer who still 
 
70 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 clung to the idea that there is a substance of mathe- 
 matics ? 
 
 Professor Oldenberg's interpretation of the pass- 
 age quoted from the Samyuttaha JS'iMya would 
 make of the Buddha a hypocrite or a coward, for it 
 represents him as not willing to concede the last 
 consequence of his doctrine and without directly 
 telling a lie as trying to make a false impression 
 upon his interviewer. If Yacchagotta had been one 
 of Buddha's followers, there might have been a rear 
 son for Buddha's not shocking his religious faith, but 
 Yacchagotta belonged to a non-Buddhistic sect, and 
 his question was not made in anxiety or with quiv- 
 ering lips. The context of the passage refutes Pro- 
 fessor Oldenberg's interpretation. 
 
 Why not understand the passage as it reads ? Had 
 the Buddha said " the ego is not," Yacchagotta would 
 imagine that the Buddha believed in annihilation, 
 a doctrine which is unequivocally condemned in the 
 Buddhist canon as a heresy. According to Professor 
 Oldenberg, however, this would be the true import 
 of the Buddhist religion. Yacchagotta, relying on 
 the fact that his ego-consciousness was real, would 
 say : " Did not my ego exist before ? and now I am 
 told that there is no ego." In the same way the 
 hypothetical carpenter's apprentice in his interview 
 with Professor Gauss would have said : " The lines 
 which I use in measuring beams and boards are 
 real ; and yet this man who is supposed to be a great 
 authority in mathematics tells me that mathematical 
 lines are purely ideal ! " We cannot help thinking 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BtJDDHISM. 71 
 
 that if Professor Oldenberg had asked the Buddha 
 whether or not he taught the immortality of the 
 ego, the Buddha would have given him the same 
 answer as he did Yacchagotta : he would have re- 
 mained silent. 
 
 Professor Oldenberg takes a denial of the existence 
 of the ego-soul as a denial of the existence of the soul 
 itself, in the same way that the carpenter's appren- 
 tice might have understood that Professor Gauss, 
 not believing in a mathematical substance, denied 
 the existence of mathematics altogether. Truly, to 
 understand Buddhism, we must have an inkling of 
 the fundamental notions of philosophy, and with all 
 due respect for Professor Oldenberg' s philological 
 erudition, we cannot help saying that philosophical 
 comprehension is a weakness of his which renders 
 him unable to grasp the meaning of Buddhism. 
 
 The soul, according to Buddhism, does not consist 
 of substance, but consists of sankharas, which are 
 sentient structures or forms produced by deeds, by 
 karma, or function. A man's personality is name 
 and form. The name may be preserved and the 
 form may reappear in new generations. The indivi- 
 dual dies, but its form continues by rebirth. There 
 is no individuality in the sense of the Brahmanical 
 atman theory, but the individuality of a man, his 
 name and form are for that reason real enough ; and 
 name and form are either singly, or sometimes to- 
 gether, preserved and reindividualized. There is a 
 continuity in life in which the same form is preserved, 
 and this continuous preservation of form is all that 
 
72 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 is and can be meant by sameness of personality. 
 This is the secret (if there be any secret about it) of 
 the Buddhist psychology. 
 
 IS NIRVANA ANNIHILATION ? 
 
 Professor Oldenberg's conception of Buddhism 
 differs from mine ; he says in a letter to me : 
 
 " Buddhism, in ray opinion, suffers from the contradiction, 
 historically quite conceivable, that on the one hand, it retains 
 the old, concrete, and popular conception of a transmigration 
 of the soul, on the other hand dissolves in its philosophy the 
 idea of a soul as a substratum, an ego-being. This is a contra- 
 diction which will never be overcome by your attempt at sub- 
 limating the category of karma. Had Buddha not believed in 
 a transmigration of the soul, suicide should have appeared to 
 him as the quickest and best adapted means of making an end 
 of suffering. A few drops of prussic acid would be a better, 
 and at any rate a more rapid remedy than the holy eightfold 
 path." 
 
 If this opinion of the learned Pali Professor be 
 tenable, the Buddha, who is generally regarded as 
 one of the keenest thinkers that ever lived on earth, 
 would have both denied the existence of a thing and 
 at the same time have taught that it migrated from 
 place to place. And we are requested to believe 
 that the Buddha should have been guilty of such 
 a gross contradiction ! !N"o, I would rather run the 
 risk of doubting the infallibihty of a German pro- 
 fessor ! 
 
 While Professor Oldenberg's summary solution is 
 prima facie improbable, it is at the same time based 
 upon incorrectly-stated facts. Buddhism teaches 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 73 
 
 reincarnation, but it does not teach the migration of 
 the soul. Professor Oldenberg's book, although 
 good in many respects, is very deficient in its ex- 
 position of the Buddhist psychology, which is just 
 the most important part of Buddhism. Oldenberg 
 must have overlooked the passages in which the 
 theory of soul-migration, in the sense of an ego-soul 
 migrating from one body into another, is rejected. 
 Buddhism denies that the soul is a substance, and in 
 spite of Professor Oldenberg's statement to the 
 contrary, it denies also most emphatically and unequi- 
 vocally that there can be any transmigration or 
 transportation of soul-substance. Yet Buddhism 
 asserts the reappearance of the same soul-forms. 
 We read in the Questions of King Milinda^ III., 5, 
 {Sacred BooTcs of the East, XXXY., p. Ill) : 
 
 " Where there is no transmigi*ation, Nagasena, can there be 
 rebirth ? " 
 
 " Yes, there can." 
 
 " But how can that be ? Give me an illustration." 
 
 '* Suppose a man, O king, were to light a lamp from another 
 lamp, can it be said that the one transmigrates from, or to, the 
 other ? " 
 
 '' Certainly not." 
 
 "Just so, great king, is rebirth without transmigration." 
 
 *' Give me a further illustration." 
 
 " Do you recollect, great king, having learnt, when you were 
 a boy, some verse or other from your teacher ? " 
 
 ''Yes, I recollect that." 
 
 " Well, then, did that verse transmigrate from your teacher ?' 
 
 " Certainly not." 
 
 *' Just so, great king, is rebirth without transmigration." 
 
 " Very good, Nagasena I " , 
 
74 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 In the Jataka tales and other popular legends ex- 
 pressions are frequently retained which suggest the 
 old Brahmanical conception of a transmigration of 
 soul, but philosophical expositions of the problem 
 leave no doubt about the meaning of the Buddhistic 
 idea of rebirth. At any rate, here is a plain state- 
 ment in one of the most famous and authoritative 
 Buddhist scriptures, which denies that there is any 
 transmigration of a soul-entity ; and thus Professor 
 Oldenberg's charge of inconsistency falls to the 
 ground, as it rests on a misstatement of the Buddhist 
 faith. 
 
 Here is another example, adduced by Nagasena in 
 the MilindajpanKa : 
 
 The mango that is planted rots away in the ground, 
 but it is reborn in the mangoes of the tree that grows 
 from its seed. He who steals the fruit steals the 
 property of him who sowed the mango. There is 
 no transmigration of a mango-soul from the seed to 
 the fruit, but there is a reconstruction of its form. 
 Thus (as said he who came from Nazareth) the body 
 of a man can be broken down like a temple that is 
 destroyed, but it can and will be built up again. 
 The life of a man does not end with death, for his 
 soul is reincarnated again and again. 
 
 And how does this transfer of soul take place? 
 Partly by heredity as is explained by Nagasena in 
 the illustration of the mango seed, partly by com- 
 munication. A particular man is not a discrete 
 individual, but a trysting-place of soul-activities, of 
 sankharas, which are impressed into him by example 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 75 
 
 and education. Thus, a boy in school learns a verse 
 by heart; there is no transfer of soul-substance 
 migrating from the teacher to the pupil, but there is 
 a reincarnation of a certain soul-form. The teacher's 
 words are impressed into the boy ; and this is called 
 by Kagasena " rebirth without transmigration." 
 
 Similar passages and similes in explanation of the 
 same idea are found in the Visiidhi-Magga^ where 
 the transfer of soul is illustrated by the reappearance 
 of the form of a face in the mirror, of a voice in its 
 echo, of a seal in its imprint, etc. 
 
 Professor Oldenberg knows very well that Nirvana 
 in the Buddhist texts is not annihilation, but deliver- 
 ance from evil ; and there are innumerable passages 
 which characterize it as the state of highest bliss. 
 Professor Oldenberg quotes several passages from 
 various sources, which corroborate the positive con- 
 ception of Nirvana. He says : 
 
 *' Buddhist proverbs attribute in innumerable passages the 
 possession of Nirvana to the saint, who still treads the earth : 
 
 "'The disciple who has put off lust and desire, rich in 
 wisdom, has here on earth attained the deliverance from death, 
 the rest, the Nirvana, the eternal state.' Suttasangaha, fol. 
 cA., a Brahmanical ascetic addresses to Sariputta this question : 
 * Nirvana, Nirvana, so they say, friend Sariputta. But what 
 is the Nirvana, friend ? ' ' The subjugation of desire, the sub- 
 jugation of hatred, the subjugation of perplexity ; this, O 
 friend, is called Nirvana.'" {L. c, p. 264.) 
 
 But Nirvana may be the summum honum, be- 
 cause it involves the cutting off of the cause of ex- 
 istence, and the state of Nirvana may become an 
 
76 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 actual annihilation at the moment of death. Yet 
 even the final goal of saintship is not characterized 
 as an absolute extinction. Professor Oldenberg 
 quotes the following passages from the Uddna (fol. 
 ghau) : 
 
 " * There is, O disciples, a state, where there is neither earth 
 nor water, neither light nor air, neither infinity of space, nor 
 infinity of reason, nor absolute void, nor the co-extinction of 
 perception and non-perception, neither this world nor that 
 world, both sun and moon. That, O disciples, I term neither 
 coming nor going nor standing, neither death nor birth. It is 
 without basis, without procession, without cessation : that is 
 the end of sorrow. 
 
 *' ' There is, O disciples, an unborn, unoriginated, uncreated, 
 unformed. Were there not, O disciples, this unborn, unori- 
 ginated, uncreated, unformed, there would be no possible exit 
 from the world of the born, originated, created, formed.' " 
 
 Professor Oldenberg adds the following com- 
 ments : 
 
 " These words seem to sound as if we heard Brahmanical 
 philosophers talking of the Brahma, the unborn, intransient 
 which is neither great nor small, the name of which is ' No, 
 No,' for no word can exhaust its being. Yet these expres- 
 sions, when viewed in the connexion of Buddhist thought, 
 convey something wholly different. To the Brahman the 
 uncreated is so veritable a reality, that the reality of the cre- 
 ated pales before it ; the created derives its being and life 
 solely from the uncreated. For the Buddhist the words 'there 
 is an uncreated' merely signify that the created can free him- 
 self from the curse of being created (in the * Dhammapada' it 
 is said, v. 383): ' If thou hast learned the destruction of the 
 sankhara, thou knowest the uncreated' — there is a path from 
 the world of the created out into dark endlessness. Does the 
 path lead into a new existence ? Does it lead into the Nothing ? 
 The Buddhist creed rests in delicate equipoise between the 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 77 
 
 two. The longing of the heart that craves the eternal has not 
 nothing, and yet the thought has not a something, which it 
 might firmly grasp. Farther off the idea of the endless, the 
 eternal could not withdraw itself from belief than it has done 
 here, where, like a gentle flutter on the point of merging in 
 the Nothing, it threatens to evade the gaze." {lb., p. 283, 
 284.) 
 
 Is there no other interpretation of the quoted pas- 
 sages than the one ofiFered by Professor Oldenberg, 
 viz., that the Buddhist faith is equivocal, and that 
 it leaves the question undecided, either as an " un- 
 fathomable mystery," or as " resting in a delicate 
 equipoise between the idea of a new existence and 
 nothing"? 
 
 It would be difficult here for any man to speak 
 authoritatively, but it appears to me the solution is 
 not far to seek. The attainment of Nirvana consists 
 in enlightenment, that is to say, in a recognition of 
 the fundamental truths of religion, which in their 
 practical application are expressed in the noble eight- 
 fold path of righteousness. All individual craving 
 has disappeared in the saint; he has become an 
 incarnation of truth, not of theoretical or purely 
 scientific notions concerning the nature of things, 
 but of practical truth which manifests itself in a 
 moral life. Thus Nirvana is actually an utter anni- 
 hilation of the thought of self and an embodiment 
 of universal love and righteousness. Those eternal 
 conditions which constitute righteousness are real- 
 ized in a human heart. 
 
 If we translate Buddhist thought into Christian 
 terms, we would say that the attainment of Nir- 
 
78 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 vana means God-incarnation, and the Buddha is the 
 God-man. Shall we say that the eternal conditions 
 of righteousness are a mere nothing, because they 
 are unsubstantial? Are they non-existent because 
 they are not concrete things, not material objects ? 
 That would certainly lead to a serious misconcep- 
 tion of the most important facts of existence 1 
 
 Further, must God be considered as a nonentity 
 when we learn to understand that God is not an 
 individual being? Dwindles the Christian idea of 
 Heaven away, because astronomy finds no place for 
 it in the stars ? There are things spiritual the exist- 
 ence of which does not depend upon a definite 
 locality. The Pythagorean theorem is true, and 
 would remain true, even if the world existed no 
 longer. It is an eternal verity and not a mere 
 nothing. This is illustrated in the " Questions of 
 King Milinda," as follows : 
 
 *' The king said : ' Venerable Nagasena, where does wisdcmi 
 dwell?' 
 
 " ' Nowhere, O king.' 
 
 *' ' Then, sir, there is no such thing as wisdom.' 
 
 *' * Where does the wind dwell, O king ? ' 
 
 " ' Not anywhere, sir.' 
 
 " ' So there is no such thing as wind.' 
 
 " * Well answered, Nagasena.' " 
 
 It may be difiicult to the untrained to under- 
 stand the paramount importance of eternal verities, 
 but no one can deny their actual presence in life. 
 What other meaning can there be in the words of 
 Christ when he says : " Heaven and earth may pass 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 79 
 
 away, but my words shall not pass away." The 
 Buddha utters the same sentiment. He says : 
 
 '* The Buddhas are beings whose word cannot fail ; there is 
 no deviation from truth in their speech", etc. (Buddhist Birth 
 Stories, p. 18.) 
 
 The words of Buddha are not merely the sank- 
 haras of his individual existence, but the eternal 
 verities which shall not pass away, and he who 
 realizes them in his soul has attained Nirvana. 
 
 Now, I can see Professor Oldenberg smile, and 
 hear him say, " That is what I mean ; Nirvana is, 
 according to Buddha, the attainment of the eternal 
 verities, and nothing else ; accordingly it is tanta- 
 mount to extinction. Nirvana is not a place, and 
 the Buddha after his death is no longer a definite 
 individuality that can be pointed out to be here or 
 there. I^rgo he is dissolved into nothing." To be 
 identical with verities that are eternal but have no 
 dwelling-place in space is, in the opinion of many, 
 an annihilation ; for ubiquity and nullibiety are to 
 their minds two expressions of one and the same 
 thing. Kepler's soul has become the recognition of 
 the three famous laws that bear his name ; Ludolf is 
 identified with the calculation of tt ; Newton with 
 the formulation of the law of gravitation. They 
 attained, each one in his own way, some special 
 aspect of the uncreated, the eternal, the unborn. In 
 the same way the Buddha (in the Buddhistic con- 
 ception) has become the moral law which is, ever 
 was, and shall remain forever the path of delivery 
 from evil. Immortality is claimed for the Keplers, 
 
80 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 the Ludolf s, and E'ewtons, not for their names alone, 
 because their names might be forgotten, but for their 
 souls, for their ideas, for the verities with which they 
 have become identical ; and in the same sense, only 
 in the broader field of religious truth, Buddhists 
 believe in the eternal omnipresence of the Buddha. 
 If that be nothing, then " Nothing " stands for the 
 highest and noblest that can be thought of, and 
 IS^othing would be the divinest thing in the universe. 
 Indeed, those invisible realities which, when recog- 
 nized, are called truths, are of greater importance 
 than concrete things and individual beings. 
 
 This is plain to every one who understands that 
 truths are real, even though they are not substances 
 or entities. And the same is true of the soul. To 
 deny that volition, cognition and other mental 
 activities are substances, or entities, or that they 
 need a substratum or metaphysical subject in order 
 to be real, is not a denial of their existence — it is 
 simply the consistent consequence of the commonly 
 acknowledged truth that they are not material. 
 
 Here lies the main difficulty in understanding 
 Buddhism, which, whether we praise it or condemn 
 it, must be recognized as the most philosophical of 
 all religions. There is no use in understanding the 
 words of the Buddhist texts, if we have no com- 
 prehension of their meaning. And how gross Pro- 
 fessor Oldenberg's conception is, appears from his 
 proposition that unless Buddha had been guilty of 
 the inconsistency of believing in soul-transmigration, 
 suicide would have been a better remedy for the evils 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 81 
 
 of existence than the noble eightfold path of right- 
 eousness. 
 
 Suicide causes the dissolution of the individual ; it 
 sets an example which in the hearts of others will, 
 according to circumstance, bear evil fruit ; it causes 
 consternation and unrest, and can therefore not lead 
 to the cessation of suffering; under no condition 
 could it conduce to the attainment of Nirvana. He 
 who imagines that but for the supposition of a trans- 
 migration of soul, suicide would be a more appro- 
 priate and safer method of reaching Mrvana than 
 the eightfold path of righteousness, has no inkling 
 of the significance of Kirvana. 
 
 Whatever error I may be guilty of in my own 
 representations of Buddhism, be it in essays that I 
 have written or in the Gospel of Buddha^ this much 
 is sure, that Professor Oldenberg has misunderstood 
 its most salient doctrines, those on the nature of the 
 soul and of Nirvana. Being a professor who has 
 studied the southern canon of Buddhism in its original 
 documents, he is by many people looked upon as the 
 greatest living authority on the subject, and he can 
 therefore not fail to propagate his misconceptions. 
 Misconceptions in all fields of thought are unavoid- 
 able, but if they originate in men who are called upon 
 to be the channels of our information the result will 
 be sad. 
 
 Professor Oldenberg is a good scholar, and, I re- 
 peat, I gladly acknowledge my indebtedness to him 
 as a philologist ; he may also be a good historian, 
 but he has shown himself to be incompetent as an 
 
82 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 interpreter of Buddhism. His expositions remind 
 us of the parable of the hardwood,* that is related 
 in the Majjhimanihdyo^ where we read : 
 
 ** It is exactly, O monks, as if a man who demands hard- 
 wood, seeks for hardwood, and looks out for hardwood, climbs 
 over the hardwood of a big hardwood tree, over the gi'een- 
 wood, over the bark, to the boughs and cuts off a twig, tak- 
 ing it along with the idea 'that is hardwood.' Suppose that 
 a clear-sighted man observes him, saying : ' This good man 
 really knows neither hardwood, nor greenwood, nor bark, nor 
 boughs, nor foliage, therefore this good man who demands 
 hardwood, seeks for hardwood, looks out for hardwood, climbs 
 straightway over the hardwood of a large hardwood tree, over 
 the greenwood, over the bark, and cuts off a twig in the opin- 
 ion that it is hardwood. But the hardwood which he will get 
 from the hardwood of the twig will not serve his purpose." 
 
 Professor Oldenberg has devoted his life to the 
 decipherment of Sanskrit and Pali, but he has failed 
 to comprehend the significance of Buddhism. He 
 has climbed over the hardwood of the doctrine of 
 the Buddha without comprehending either its im- 
 port or possible usefulness, and, presenting us with 
 the foliage of externalities, assures us that this is 
 the hardwood of Buddhism. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 Buddhism is decidedly not nihilism, and Mrvana 
 does not mean annihilation. Buddhism in its pur- 
 est form is, more than any other religion, stated in 
 philosophical terms, which, the more positively pbil- 
 
 * See Karl Eugen Neumann^ Die Beden Gotamo Buddlid's, 
 p. 304-325, 
 
THE PHILOSOPHY OF BUDDHISM. 83 
 
 osophical they are, will naturally appear to unphilo- 
 sophical minds as mere negations. 
 
 Christians find it difficult to comprehend Bud- 
 dhism, but the fact remains that what Christianity 
 has been to Western peoples. Buddhism was to the 
 nations of the East ; and all the dissimilarities will 
 in the end only serve to render the similarities that 
 obtain between them the more remarkable. 
 
 AVhile we are not blind to the great preferences 
 of Christianity, we must grant that Buddhism is a 
 truly cosmopolitan religion. Buddhism can com- 
 prehend other religions and interpret their mytholo- 
 gies, but no mythology is wide enough to compre- 
 hend Buddhism. Buddhism is, as it were, religious 
 mythology explained in scientific terms; it is the 
 esoteric secret of all exoteric doctrines. It is the 
 skeleton key which in its abstract simplicity fits 
 all locks. 
 
 This is the reason why Buddhism can adapt itself 
 to almost any condition and can satisfy the spiritual 
 needs of great and small, high and low, of the 
 learned as well as the uncultured. It offers food for 
 thought to the philosopher, comfort to the afilicted, 
 and affords a stay to those that struggle. It is a 
 guide through the temptations of life and a lesson 
 to those in danger of straying from the right path. 
 And yet it demands no belief in the impossible ; it 
 dispenses with miracles, it assumes no authority ex- 
 cept the illumination of a right comprehension of 
 the facts of existence. 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. . 
 
 THE ATMAN. 
 
 "DRAHMAinSM and Buddhism form a strong con- 
 -^ trast, which becomes most apparent in the con- 
 ception of the soul. Brahmanism is a religion of 
 postulates, the basic doctrine of which must be taken 
 on faith, while Buddhism is a religion of facts, re- 
 jecting altogether assumptions of any kind. Brah- 
 manism teaches the existence of an Atman, or a self- 
 soul ; Buddhism rejects the theory of the existence 
 of an Atman. 
 
 What is the Atman ? 
 
 About two thousand five hundred years ago the 
 Indian mind was engaged with the problem " What 
 am I ? " and the documents which still reveal to us 
 the lines of argument and the chief results of these 
 investigations are called the XJpanishads. The 
 Brahman thinker considering all the various ingre- 
 dients of his make-up comes to the conclusion that 
 none of them constitutes his Self, and now, instead 
 of arguing that his Self is the organized totality of 
 all his parts, he comes to the conclusion that Self is 
 a separate being in itself. 
 
 The self or Atman was regarded as that some- 
 thing which says, " I am," and remains the same in 
 84 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM.. 85 
 
 all changes. It is called the Unconditioned, the 
 Absolute, the Eternal, the Immortal. 
 
 What is this Self? Is it our body? I^o ! Our 
 body is subject to change ; it is born, grows, then it 
 decays, and, at last, it will die. The body is not the 
 Self. 
 
 Is our mind the Self ? The same answer. Our 
 mind is not unconditioned ; our mental activity is 
 subject to change. Therefore, our mind is not the 
 Self. 
 
 Perhaps our emotions are the Self ? But how can 
 they be the Self, for they come and go and are as 
 variable as the body and the mind. 
 
 Body, mind, and the emotional soul (so the Brah- 
 mans say) are the vestures only of the Self ; they 
 are the husks or sheaths which envelope and hide it. 
 The Self gives reality to, and is in possession of, 
 body, mind, and soul. The self is the mysterious 
 " ^kasa," or quintessence of being, without which 
 reality would not exist. We read : 
 
 " This immutable one is the unseen seer, the unheard 
 hearer, the unthought thinker, the unknown knower."* 
 
 We read in the Chandogya Upanishad : 
 
 " The body is mortal and always held by death. It is the 
 abode of that Self which is immortal and without body." 
 (Sacred Books of the East, Vol. 1., pp. 140-141.) 
 
 The Self is supposed to be the " person " (puru- 
 sha=person or soul) who is the agent in all the or- 
 
 * Dvivedi, The Imitation of S^ankara, p. 15. 
 
86 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHEISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 gans. The Self is the seer in the eye, the smeller 
 in the nose, the thinker of the thoughts. Thus 
 Prajapati, the Lord of Creation, instructs Indra on 
 the nature of the self : 
 
 " Now where the sight has entered into the void (the pupil 
 of the eye) , there is the person of the eye, the eye itself is the 
 instrument of seeing. He who knows, let me smell this, he 
 is the Self, the nose is the instrument of smelling. He who 
 knows, let me say this, he is the Self, the tongue is the in- 
 strument of saying. He who knows, let me hear this, he is 
 the Self, the ear is the instrument of hearing. 
 
 " He who knows, let me think this, he is the self, the mind 
 is his divine eye. He, the Self, seeing these pleasures (which 
 to others are hidden like a buried treasure of gold) through 
 his divine eye, i. e., the mind, rejoices. 
 
 *' The Devas who are in the world of Brahman meditate on 
 that self (as taught by Prajapati to Indra, and by Indra to the 
 Devas). Therefore all worlds belong to them, and all desires. 
 He who knows that Self and understands it, obtains all worlds 
 and all desires. Thus said Prajapati, yea, thus said Praja- 
 pati." {Sacred Books of the East, Vol. I., p. 143.) 
 
 Here the Self is defined as the consciousness of 
 the ego-idea. The Self is said to be "he who 
 knows, *Let me smell, hear, think, or do this.'" 
 The notion of Self is founded upon the fact that 
 there is something in us which says " I am," and 
 the question rises whether or not we are justified in 
 regarding the consciousness as the Self, and the Self 
 s an independent being. 
 
 hat is the reality that corresponds to the pro- 
 
 •1 ' "I?" 
 
 The word " I " is a central and therefore very im- 
 portant idea among many other ideas which consti- 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 87 
 
 tute man's soul. The brain-structure in which this 
 little word " I " resides is situated, together with all 
 speech, in the island of Rolando, on the left hemi- 
 sphere of the brain ; and if it is conscious, we speak 
 of this condition as ego-consciousness or self-con- 
 sciousness. Its great prominence among other 
 ideas is due to its significance which comprises 
 nothing more nor less than the whole personality 
 of the speaker. It may now mean the speaker's 
 sentiments, now his body, now one of his limbs, 
 now his thoughts, now his past history, now the 
 potentialities of his future. 
 
 Considered by itself without the contents of its 
 meaning, the pronoun " I " (frequently called the 
 "ego" by philosophers) is as empty as a hollow 
 water bubble; if devoid of the realities which it 
 comprises in its meaning, it is a mere abstract ; it is 
 a cipher by which the speaker denotes himself. If 
 regarded as a thing in itself, the word is without 
 sense ; it is like a circle without center and peri- 
 phery ; like a cart without wheels, box, and beam ; 
 like a tree without roots, stem, and branches. To 
 reify or hypostatize it as a being in itself is a logi- 
 cal fallacy ; and to build upon this fallacy a meta- 
 physical system is a grave error, which naturally 
 leads to the most fantastical illusions. We might as 
 well hypostatize any and all other words or abstrac- 
 tions and regard them as real entities and things in 
 themselves. In this way mythology has peopled 
 our imagination with all kinds of chimeras, fairies, 
 ogres, gods, and devils. 
 
88 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 It is interesting to know the arguments by which 
 the unity of animated life which manifests itself in 
 consciousness was identified with prana, which 
 means breath, vital principle or the conscious ani- 
 mation of the body. Prajapati explains that that is 
 the true Self which when leaving the body renders 
 the body most wretched. And this is to be honored 
 like " Uktha," the divine hymn, the embodiment of 
 divine revelation. Thus all the constituents of man, 
 conceived as Devas, made the experiment. We read 
 in the Aitareya-Aranyaka : 
 
 " * Well,' they said, * let us all go out from this body ; then 
 on whose departure this body shall fall, he shall be the uktha 
 among us.' 
 
 " Speech went out, yet the body without speaking remained, 
 eating and drinking. 
 
 "Sight went out, yet the body without seeing remained, 
 eating and drinking. 
 
 " Hearing went out, yet the body without hearing re- 
 mained, eating and drinking. 
 
 '* Mind went out, yet the body, as if blinking, remained, eat- 
 ing and drinking. 
 
 "Breath went out, then when breath was gone out, the 
 body fell. . . . 
 
 "They strove again, saying: * lam the uktha, I am the 
 uktha.' 'Well,' they said, 'let us enter that body again; 
 then on whose entrance this body shall rise again, he shall be 
 the uktha among us.' 
 
 " Speech entered, but the body lay still. Sight entered, but 
 the body lay still. Hearing entered, but the body lay still. 
 Mind entered, but the body lay still. Breath entered, and 
 when breath had entered, the body rose, and it became the 
 uktha. 
 
 " Therefore breath alone is the uktha. 
 
 " Let people know that breath is the uktha indeed. 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PKOBLEM. 89 
 
 " The Devas (the other senses) said to breath : * Thou art 
 the uktha, thou art all this, we are thine, thou art ours'." 
 (Sacred Books of the East, Vol. I., pp. 206-207.) 
 
 We can trace in the Upanishads the logical argu- 
 ments on which the Indian mind arrived at the idea 
 of an independent Self, as the breath or spirit of 
 man which at the moment of death was supposed to 
 leave the body and to continue in an independent 
 existence as an immortal being. Breath became 
 identified with consciousness and was supposed to 
 be the Self and is called Sattya, i. e., the true (p. 
 209). It is the mover of movements and the agent 
 of actions. It is that by which we obtain strength, 
 and its recognition is the object of all knowledge. 
 In Shankara's philosophy the Self plays the part of 
 Kant's thing in itself. The Self is described to us 
 in the Talavakara-Upanishad {Sacred Books of the 
 East, I., p. 14Y) : 
 
 ** It is the ear of the ear, the mind of the mind, the speech 
 of speech, the breath, of breath, and the eye of the eye. When 
 freed (from the senses) the wise, on departing from this world, 
 become immortal." 
 
 And it is by recognizing the Self that " the wise 
 become immortal when they have departed from 
 this world " {ih., p. 149). 
 
 The Self was identified with God, the Creator. 
 Brahman was said to be the Self ; and " in the be- 
 ginning there was only Self. He was alone; and 
 there was nothing else whatsoever." (Aitareya- 
 
90 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHKISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Aranyeka, Vol. I., p. 1.) Having created worlds 
 and the various deities, Agni (fire), Yayu (air), 
 Aditya (sun), the Dis (regions), Kandramas (moon), 
 and the rest, the Self created man, and all the gods 
 entered into man to ensoul him. They endowed 
 him with breath, sight, touch, speech, digestion, and 
 other functions. At last the Self entered through the 
 suture of the cranium. We read in the Aitareya 
 Aranyaka : * 
 
 *'And then the Self thought: *If speech names, if scent 
 smells, if the eye sees, if the ear hears, if the skin feels, if the 
 mind thinks, if the off-breathing digests, if the organ dis- 
 charges, then what am I ? ' 
 
 '* Then opening the sutiire of the skull, he got in by that 
 door. 
 
 " That door is called the Vidriti (tearing asunder), the NAn- 
 dana (the place of bliss). 
 
 '* There are three dwelling-places for him, three dreams ; 
 this dwelling-place (the eye), this dwelling-place (the throat), 
 this dwelling-place (the heart). . 
 
 " When born (when the Highest Self had entered the body) 
 he looked through all things, in order to see whether anything 
 wished to proclaim here another (Self). He saw this person 
 only (himself) as the widely spread Brahman. ' I saw it,' thus 
 he said : 
 
 " Therefore he was (named) * Idam-dra ' (seeing this). 
 
 "Being Idamdra by name, they call him Indra mysteri- 
 ously. For the Devas love mystery, yea, they love mystery." 
 
 Of such importance did the Hindu thinkers re- 
 gard the conception of Self, which as an independ- 
 ent spiritual being was compared to "a bank or 
 boundary, so that these worlds may not be con- 
 founded," that they made the belief in its existence 
 * Sacred Books of the East, Vol. I., p. 242. 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 91 
 
 an article of faith. Knowledge of the Self was sup- 
 posed to be a divine revelation which would not 
 have obtained except by the supernatural existence 
 of the gods, of Prajapati, of Brahma, of the Lord. 
 The Self is mysterious in its nature. It cannot be 
 discovered either by sense-experience or by scientific 
 investigation ; for : 
 
 " The eye has no access there, nor has speech nor mind ; we 
 do not know the Self, nor the method whereby we can impart 
 It. It is other than the known as well as the unknown ; so in- 
 deed do we hear from the sages of old who explained It thus 
 to us."* 
 
 The existence of Self must be believed. We read 
 in the Ch'andogya Upanishad {Sacred Books of the 
 East, I., page 122) : 
 
 **When one believes, then one perceives. One who does 
 not believe, does not perceive. Only he who believes, per- 
 ceives." 
 
 On the belief in the existence of the Self man's 
 eternal salvation was supposed to depend. We read 
 (Sacred Boohs of the East, Yol. I., p. 124) : 
 
 "To him who sees, perceives, and understands this, the 
 spirit (prana) springs from the Self, hope springs from the 
 Self, memory springs from the Self ; so do ether, fire, water, 
 appearance and disappearance, food, power, understanding, 
 reflexion, consideration, will, mind, speech, names, sacred 
 hymns, and sacrifices — aye, all this springs from the Self." 
 
 " There is this verse, ' He who sees this, does not see death, 
 nor illness, nor pain ; he who sees this, sees everything, and 
 obtains everything everywhere.' 
 
 ♦Dvivedi, Z. Z., p. 6. 
 
92 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 *' He who sees, perceives, and understands this, loves the 
 Self, delights in the Self, revels in the Self, rejoices in the Self 
 — he becomes a Svaraj (an autocrat or self -ruler) ; he is lord 
 and master in all the worlds." 
 
 There are various complicated systems elaborated 
 from the metaphysics of the conception of the Self. 
 Most of the Indian philosophers identify the Self 
 with Brahma, so that there is really only one Self 
 which manifests itself in many various Selves ; and 
 since the Self alone is real, the material universe is 
 conceived as mere appearance, as sham, as an illu- 
 sion of the senses. This is the doctrine of the Ye- 
 danta School, the greatest representative of which 
 is Shankara, a thinker of unusual power and of 
 great influence. 
 
 The Yedanta philosophy is called advaita, or the 
 non-duality doctrine, as opposed to the dualism of 
 the Samkhya School, whose founder taught that 
 there are innumerable Selves uncreated and inde- 
 structible, among whom many, by the error of not 
 distinguishing between Self and Body, got entangled 
 into this material world of suffering, from which 
 they can be ransomed only by the recognition of the 
 true nature of the Self. 
 
 Whatever view we may take, one thing is certain, 
 that the assumption of an independent metaphysical 
 Self, involves us in contradictions and vagaries 
 wherever we turn and however wisely we may 
 attempt to avoid its consequences. 
 
 * * 4t -X- -Jf 
 
 In opposition to these speculations, Buddha denied 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 93 
 
 the existence of an independent Self as the soul of 
 man. While the Brahmans spoke of the Self in a 
 dualistic sense, " as of a razor that might be fitted in 
 a razor-case," or " as a fire that might be lit in a fire- 
 place," Buddha propounded a consistent Monism in 
 which he radically ignored all metaphysical assump- 
 tions and philosophical postulates, founding his re- 
 ligion on a consideration of the pure facts of experi- 
 ence. While the Brahmans declared that the Self 
 is immortal and immutable, " that it is not increased 
 by a good action, or decreased by a bad action," 
 Buddha taught that there was no use in trying to 
 improve the immutable ; but he found it imperative 
 to improve man; and man's nature, according to 
 Buddha, consists of karma, i. e., of actions, or to use 
 a term of natural science, of functions. Man is the 
 product of the life and thought functions of former 
 existences, and his own karma continues as a living 
 factor in the generations to come. 
 
 In Brahmanism facts are nothing, and idea, that 
 is to say theory, is everything. In Buddhism theory 
 is nothing, and facts are everything. Theory has 
 sense only as a comprehensive formulation of facts.^ 
 
 The Self of the Brahmans is Kant's thing-in-itself 
 applied to religion. It is the thing-in-itself of man's 
 soul. It is the hypostatization of the abstraction of 
 self-consciousness, which is carried so far as to deify 
 that feature of existence which is common to all be- 
 ings and to regard the particular forms which they 
 assume as unessential. From this standpoint all 
 *See Dvivedi, Z. L, Introduction, p. xix, 
 
94 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 differences disappear, and, as the Bhagavadgita de- 
 clares, "a Brahman full of learning and virtue, a 
 cow, an elephant, a dog, and one of low caste," all 
 are on the same level. Shankara, speaking of " the 
 nightmare of separateness," says : 
 
 " He who has the firm conviction * I am this consciousness,' 
 not the form it takes, let him be a Brahmana or a Chandala, 
 my mind points to him as the real Master."* 
 
 Buddha would on the contrary insist that the form 
 in which consciousness appears is the man himself ; 
 that that particular form functioning in a particular 
 way is that particular man ; but that consciousness 
 in itself, a consciousness which has no particular 
 form and is consciousness in general, is a mere fic- 
 tion, an empty abstraction, and a thought as " hollow 
 as a water-bubble," and as "hollow as a plantain 
 tree." 
 
 Shankara was an adversary of Buddhism, and the 
 report goes that he had instigated the people to mas- 
 sacre the Buddhists without mercy. This report 
 may have been untrue, but this much is certain, that 
 Shankara was the most energetic reformer of Brah- 
 manism at the time when Buddhism began to lose 
 its hold on the Hindu mind. While Shankara re- 
 jected Buddha's philosophy, he adopted those moral 
 truths of his doctrines which had most deeply im- 
 pressed the people of India, universal love, compas- 
 sion with the suffering, and the solidarity of all life. 
 And here this theory of the Self merges into Pan- 
 * TfiQ Imitation of S'ankara, p. 181, 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 95 
 
 theism. He sees with the poet of the Bhagavadgita 
 " all beings in Self, and Self in all beings." Feeling 
 the thrill of omneity in his heart, Shankara says : 
 
 " I am all bliss, the bliss all eternal consciousness. 
 Death I fear not, caste I respect not, father, mother, nay even 
 birth, I know not, relatives, friends, I recognize not, teacher 
 and pupil I own not ; — I am all bliss, the bliss all eternal con- 
 sciousness."* 
 
 While Shankara has become the undisputed leader 
 of Hindu thought, whose sway reaches down to the 
 present time, we must not omit to mention another 
 less prominent school, founded by Eamanuja, which 
 has worked out the doctrine of the Self in a forni 
 that peculiarly and closely resembles the soul-con- 
 ception of modern Christianity. Eamanuja believes 
 in a triad of existences: (1) the Highest Self, who is 
 Para-Brahman, or Ishvara, or Yishnu, the Creator 
 and Lord ; (2) innumerable Selves of human beings, 
 who possess separate and distinct existences; and 
 (3) the not-self of the inanimate world. Eamanuja's 
 moral ideal for human Selves consists in the attain- 
 ment of a union with the Highest Self, in which, 
 however, their separate identities and their individual 
 consciousnesses are not lost. 
 
 * * * 4f * 
 
 The contrast between a religion based upon a be- 
 lief in postulates and a religion based upon facts has 
 not as yet disappeared. The dogmatic Christianity 
 of the present day is a revival of the metaphysics of 
 the Upanishads, and some representative Christian 
 
 * The Imitation of S'ankara, pp. 157-158 and 156, 
 
96 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 authors remind us very much of the logic and modes 
 of thought of the old Brahmans. Thus Mr. Glad- 
 stone, in his article on " The Future Life," says : 
 
 " The power of death to destroy living beings is conditioned 
 by their being compounded. For as consciousness is indivisible, 
 so it should seem is the conscious being in which it resides. 
 And, if this be so, it follows that, the body extraneous and 
 foreign to the true self, no presumption can arise out of the 
 dissolution of the body against the continued existence of the 
 true self. 
 
 "As we lose limbs, organs of sense, and yet the true self 
 continues ; and as animal bodies are always in a state of flux, 
 with no corresponding loss or gain of the true self, we again 
 infer the distinctness of that true self from the body, and its 
 independence at the time of death." 
 
 If this passage, which contains the gist of Mr. 
 Gladstone's argument in favor of an immortality in 
 another world of immaterial existence, appeared in 
 one of the Upanishads, it could not be regarded as 
 out of place there, so closely does it resemble the 
 line of thought set forth by Brahman sages. But 
 the objection that Buddha made against the assump- 
 tion of an independent Self holds good with the 
 same force against Christian metaphysics as against 
 Brahmanical speculations. 
 
 If modern psychology has accomplished anything 
 beyond the shadow of doubt, it is this, that con- 
 sciousness is not an indivisible unity, but a unification, 
 a systematization or a focussing of feelings. These 
 feelings, when not centralized, as in dreams or 
 swoons, continue in a condition that is commonly 
 called subconscious. The province of subconscious 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 97 
 
 activity in a man's soul is very large, by far larger 
 than the narrow circle that under the stress of atten- 
 tion appears on the surface of consciousness. 
 ***** 
 
 But is this not a dreary doctrine as it denies the 
 existence of the Soul ? Those readers who have fol- 
 lowed us in our exposition on the nature of the Soul 
 know that the Buddhist doctrine is neither dreary, 
 nor nihilistic, nor does it deny the existence of the 
 Soul. It only denies the assumption of the exist- 
 ence of a metaphysical Self, of an Atman, an inde- 
 pendent ego-being, and proves that the Soul is larger 
 than the ego. The rescission of that artificial wall 
 raised up round the conception of our Self opens the 
 vistas of eternity, both in the past and the future ; 
 it shows the connection in which our Soul stands 
 with the whole evolution of life upon earth and im- 
 presses us with the importance of our deeds which 
 will continue for good or evil in after-life.* 
 
 ** Not from the blank Inane emerged the soul : 
 A sacred treasury it is of dreams 
 And deeds that built the present from the past, 
 Adding thereto its own experiences. 
 Ancestral lives are seeing in mine eyes, 
 Their hearing listeneth within mine ears, 
 And in my hand their strength is plied again. 
 Speech came, a rich consignment from the past. 
 Each word aglow with wondrous spirit life. 
 Thus building up my soul of myriad souls. 
 
 " I call that something ' I ' which seems my soul ; 
 Yet more the spirit is than ego holds. 
 
 * De Rerum Natura, pp. 7-8. 
 7 
 
98 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 For lo ! this ego, where shall it be sought? 
 
 I'm wont to say ' I see ; ' yet 'tis the eye 
 
 That sees, and seeing, kind'leth in the thought 
 
 The beaming images of memory. 
 
 ' I hear' we say : Hearing is of the ear ; 
 
 And where the caught word stirs, there chords resound 
 
 Of slumb'ring sentiment ; and echoes wake 
 
 Of sounds that long ago to silence lapsed. 
 
 Not dead, perfected only, is the past ; 
 
 And ever from the darkness of the grave 
 
 It rises to rejuvenated life. 
 
 " The ' I ' is but a name to clothe withal 
 The clustered mass that now my being forms. 
 Take not the symbol for reality — 
 The transient for th' eteme. Mine ego, lo I 
 'Tis but my spirit's scintillating play 
 This fluctuant moment of eternities 
 That now are crossing where my heart's blood beats. 
 I was not, am, and soon will pass. But never 
 My soul shall cease ; the breeding ages aye 
 Shall know its life. All that the past bequeathed, 
 And all that life hath added unto me, 
 This shall endure in immortality." 
 
 GOETHE A BUDDHIST,* 
 
 Buddhism is commonly regarded as a religion, 
 which, though it may be adapted to the passive 
 
 * The greater number of Goethe's poems quoted in this arti- 
 cle are not commonly known in English-speaking countries, 
 or at least have never as yet been translated into English. 
 The translations offered here (with the exception of three 
 bearing the signatures of Bayard Taylor, J. S. Dwight, and 
 Edgar Alfred Bowring) are by the author. 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 99 
 
 nations of Asia,could never have exercised any lasting 
 influence upon the energetic races of the West. But 
 this is true only if Buddhism is identified with that 
 quietism which makes of indolence the cardinal 
 virtue of life. Nothing, however, is further removed 
 from the Tathagata's teachings than passive indif- 
 ference ; and the truth is that some of the greatest 
 geniuses of Europe have spontaneously developed 
 the essential doctrines of the venerable sage of the 
 Shakya, in whom Buddhists take refuge. 
 
 One of the most striking examples of Buddhistic 
 modes of thought in a Western mind, incredible 
 though it may appear to those who persistently 
 misunderstand the spirit of Buddhism, is the great 
 German poet Wolfgang Goethe, the Darwinist be- 
 fore Darwin, the prophet of monism and positivism, 
 the naturalist among bards and the bard among 
 naturalists. Goethe, unlike Auguste Comte the 
 founder of the French positivism, did not believe in 
 unknowable causes behind phenomena. He pro- 
 claimed the principle of genuine positivism, saying : * 
 
 •' The highest would be to understand that all facts are them- 
 selves theory. The azure color of the sky reveals to us the 
 fundamental law of chromatics. We must not seek anything 
 behind phenomena ; for they themselves are our lesson." 
 
 ** Das Hochste ware : zu begreifen, dass alles Factische 
 schon Theorie ist. Die Blaue des Himmels offenbart uns das 
 Grundgesetz der Chromatik. Man suche nur nichts hinter 
 den Phanomenen : sie selbst sind die Lehre." 
 
 This principle implies the denial of all things in 
 * Spruche in Prosa, Edition Cotta, Vol. XIII., p. 274. 
 
100 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 themselves supposed to reside in man's soul as well 
 as in the world as a whole ; and this truth is ex- 
 pressed by Buddha in the sentence : " There is no 
 atman." We shall prove our proposition that, in 
 this sense, Goethe was a Buddhist, by quoting sev- 
 eral of his poems which prove that he espoused the 
 doctrine of Karma as well as the Buddhist psychol- 
 ogy, which knows nothing of an atman or separate 
 ego-self but regards the soul of man as a complex 
 product of many ingredients constituting our Karma 
 inherited from former existences and destined to 
 continue after death according to our deeds done 
 during life. 
 
 Goethe analyzes himself in the following poem : 
 
 ** From father my inheritance 
 Is stature and conduct steady ; 
 From mother my glee, that love of romance, 
 And a tongue that's ever ready. 
 
 My grandpa was fond of ladies fair, 
 
 Which still my soul is haunting. 
 My grandma jewels loved to wear. 
 
 Like her I'm given to vaunting. 
 
 Now since this complex can't but be 
 
 The sum of all these features. 
 What is original in me 
 
 Or other human creatures ? " 
 
 " Vom Vater hab ich die Statur, 
 Des Lebens ernstes Fiihren, 
 Von Mutterchen die Frohnatur 
 Und Lust zu fabuliren. 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 101 
 
 Urahnherr war der Schonsten hold, 
 Das spukt so hin und wieder ; 
 Urahnfrau liebte Schmuck und Gold, 
 Das zuckt wohl durch die Glieder. 
 
 Sind nun die Elemente nicht • ' ',, \ ', ' 
 
 Aus dem Complex zu trennen, \ ,' i ''i =• ' ' 
 
 Was ist denn an dem ganzen Wioht > > ' > ' ' > '■' 
 Original zu nennen ? " o^ , >,'\ ] , / ' ' 
 
 The question " What am I ? " is answered by 
 Goethe : I am a commonwealth of inherited ten- 
 dencies and ideas. 
 
 Man is inclined to look upon his own sweet self as 
 a distinct and separate being which is something 
 quite original and a thing in itself, analogous to the 
 metaphysical things in themselves of Kantian phi- 
 losophy. But this notion of oneself is an error ; it 
 is what Buddhists call " the illusion of the thought 
 ' I am.' " The central idea of Buddhism is the doc- 
 trine that enlightenment dispels the ego-illusion, 
 and Goethe says tersely : 
 
 ♦' • Cognize thyself,' 'tis said. How does self-knowledge pay ? 
 When I cognize myself, J must at once away." 
 
 " Erkenne dich ! — Was hab ich da fiir Lohn ? 
 Erkenn' ich mich, so muss ich gleich davon." 
 
 Goethe was a man of great self-assertion and it is 
 apparent that he does not mean self-annihilation or 
 resignation. Goethe does not mean to say that he 
 himself (Goethe or Goethe's soul) does not exist. 
 He means that that vanity of self which imagines 
 
102 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 that a man's self consists in an independent and 
 quite original being which is exclusively a thing of 
 its own is an illusion that is dispelled by self-knowl- 
 edge. 
 
 '/I",ani not a separate ego-consciousness that is 
 in possfc'ssipR of a soul with all its impulses, thoughts, 
 and . aspirations. Rather the reverse is true. My 
 soul, consisting of definite soul-structures, is in pos- 
 session of an ego consciousness ; and my entire soul 
 is meant when I say " I." In this sense every one 
 can say of himself, " I existed long before I was 
 born." To be sure I did not exist in this exact 
 combination of soul-elements ; but the soul-elements 
 of my Karma existed. 
 
 Such is the Buddhistic doctrine, and such is Goe- 
 the's view of the soul. The words which constitute 
 our thought, the most essential part of ourselves, 
 were first uttered millenniums ago, and have been 
 handed down with imperceptible changes in pro- 
 nunciation, grammar, and construction until they 
 have become again incarnated in the system of our 
 mind. But it is not our language alone that existed 
 before us, but also our habits of daily life, our modes 
 of living, our loves and hates, our morals, our hopes, 
 and our aspirations. Goethe says ; 
 
 ** When eagerly a child looks round, 
 In his father's house his shelter is found. 
 His ear, beginning to understand, 
 Imbibes the speech of his native land. 
 
 Whatever his own experiences are, 
 He hears of other things afar. 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 103 
 
 Example affects him ; he grows strong and steady 
 Yet finds the world complete and ready. 
 
 This is prized, and that praised with much ado ; 
 He wishes to be somebody too. 
 How can he work and woo, how fight and frown ? 
 For everything has been written down. 
 
 Nay, worse, it has appeared in print, 
 The youth is baffled but takes the hint. 
 It dawns on him, now, more and more 
 He is what others have been before." 
 
 " Wenn Kindesblick begierig schaut, 
 Er findet des Vaters Haus gebaut ; 
 Und wenn das Ohr sich erst vertraut, 
 Ihm tont der Muttersprache Laut ; 
 Gewahrt er diess und jenes nah, 
 Man fabelt ihm, was fern geschah, 
 Umsittigt ihn, wachst er heran : 
 Er findet eben alles gethan ; 
 Man riihmt ihm diess, man preist ihm das : 
 Er ware gar gern auch etwas. 
 Wie er soil wirken, schaffen, lieben, 
 Das steht ja alles schon geschrieben 
 Und, was noch schlimmer ist, gedruckt. 
 Da steht der junge Mensch verduckt 
 Und endlich wird ihm offenbar : 
 Er sei nur was ein andrer war." 
 
 The idea that we are an individual in the literal 
 sense of the word, i. e., an indivisible soul-being ; a 
 genuine unity but not a unification ; a kind of spirit- 
 monad, seems at first sight to flatter our vanity, be- 
 cause it renders us independent of our own past that 
 produced us, and ignores the debt we owe to our 
 spiritual and physical ancestry, giving us the appear- 
 
104 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 ance of originality. With a good deal of humor 
 Goethe describes this craving of our natural vanity 
 in these lines : 
 
 ** Would from tradition break away, 
 
 Original I'd be 1 
 Yet the feat so grand, to my dismay, 
 
 Greatly discomfits me. 
 The honor of being an autochthon * 
 
 Would be a great ambition. 
 But strange enough, I have to own, 
 
 I am myself tradition." 
 
 " Gem war ich Ueberliefrung los 
 Und ganz original ; 
 Doch ist das Untemehmen gross 
 Und fiihrt in manche Qual. 
 Als Autochthone rechnet' ich 
 Es mir zur hochsten Ehre, 
 Wenn ich nicht gar zu wunderlich 
 Selbst Ueberliefnmg ware." 
 
 The two last lines express in simple terms the 
 substance of both the ancient Buddhist doctrine of 
 Karma and modern psychology. We do not have 
 our thoughts, habits, and aspirations, but we are 
 they. That which existed before us and is being 
 handed down from generation to generation, is our 
 own pre-existence. We do not receive the tradition 
 of the past, but we ourselves are this tradition as it 
 has been shaped by the Karma of the past. 
 
 This conception of the soul seems to lead to a 
 
 * From avrdf, self, and ;t^6)v, earth, meaning " sprung from 
 the earth, an aboriginal inhabitant " ; here, ''unconditioned 
 
 by history," or " absolutely original." 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 105 
 
 splitting up of our existence into as many personali- 
 ties as receive the soul-seeds of our Karma. But the 
 splitting up is not an absorption into a vague and in- 
 definite half -existence, but rather a duplication and 
 multiplication of our soul in the way a pattern is re- 
 produced, or as a book that is printed in many 
 copies may sow the seed of the author's thought in 
 its entirety in the hearts of innumerable readers. 
 There is a splitting up, but no division ; there is a 
 scattering of our spiritual treasures, but everywhere 
 the soul remains entire, both in its inner sentiments 
 and outer forms. Says Goethe : 
 
 " Life I never can divide, 
 
 Inner and outer together you see. 
 Whole to all I must abide, 
 
 Otherwise I cannot be. 
 Always I have only writ 
 
 What I feel and mean to say. 
 Thus, my friends, although I split, 
 
 Yet remain I one alway." 
 
 " Theilen kann ich nicht das Leben, 
 
 Nicht das Innen noch das Aussen, 
 Allen muss das Ganze geben, 
 
 Um mit euch und mir zu hausen, 
 Immer hab ich nur geschrieben 
 
 Wie ich fiihle, wie ich's meine, 
 Und so spalt ich raich, ihr Lieben, 
 
 Und bin immerfort der Eine." 
 
 This conception of our own being is of practical 
 importance, for it teaches us to think with reverence 
 of the past, and to contemplate with earnestness the 
 
106 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 future. Our existence is not limited to the span of 
 the present life ; it is not limited by birth and death ; 
 it began with the appearance of life upon earth ; 
 nay, it is older than that even ; for it lay hidden in 
 the conditions of organized life, whatever they may 
 have been ; and we shall continue to live so long as 
 mankind will flourish on earth, nay, even longer ; 
 for wherever the same soul-structures rise, there our 
 soul will be formed again and rise anew into being. 
 In a word, our soul is illimited, in the past as well 
 as in the future. Eternity lies behind us and also 
 before us. 
 
 Goethe believes in immortality. He says : 
 
 *' * Hast immortality in mind 
 Wilt thou the reasons give ? ' 
 — The most important reason is, 
 We can't without it live." 
 
 " * Du hast Unsterblichkeit im Sinn ; 
 
 Kannst du uns deine Grunde nennen ?' 
 Gar wohl ! Der Hauptgrund liegt darin, 
 Dass wir sie nicht entbehren konnen." 
 
 Goethe does not believe that immortality involves 
 the belief in a Utopian heaven, and, like Buddha, he 
 urges that if such a heaven existed, as many Chris- 
 tians imagine it to be, it would not be a place of sal- 
 vation, but a mere transfiguration of the trivialities 
 of this world. Thus Goethe prefers to be counted 
 among the Sadducees, of whom the Scriptures say, 
 they hold that there is no resurrection from the 
 dead. Goethe says : 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 107 
 
 *• A Sadducee I'll be fore'er, 
 For it would drive me to despair, 
 If the Philistines who now cramp me 
 Would cripple my eternity. 
 Twould be the same old fiddle-faddle, 
 In heaven we'd have celestial twaddle." 
 
 " Ein Sadducaer will ich bleiben ! — 
 Das konnte mich zur Verzweiflung treiben, 
 Dass von dem Volk, das hier mich bedrangt, 
 Auch wiirde die Ewigkeit eingeengt : 
 Das war doch nur der alte Patsch, 
 Droben gab's nur verklarten Klatsch." 
 
 Immortality is not an intrinsic condition of our 
 soul, but can only be the result of our exertions. 
 "We do not possess immortality, but we must earn 
 it. As Christ expresses it, we must lay up treasures 
 which neither moth nor rust doth corrupt and 
 where the thieves do not break through or steal. 
 "We are tradition and we live on as tradition. Our 
 own immortalization is the purpose of our life. 
 Goethe says : 
 
 *' Drop all of transciency 
 Whate'er be its claim, 
 Ourselves to immortalize, 
 That is our aim." 
 
 ** Nichts vom Verganglichen, 
 Wie's auch geschah I 
 Uns zu verewigen 
 Sind wir ja da." 
 
 The Egyptian method of immortalizing the bodies 
 of the dead by embalming and mummifying, and of 
 
108 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 building pyramids is erroneous ; rather let the tradi- 
 tion of which we consist and which we impart to 
 others be of the right kind. The greatest treasures 
 we can give to others are we ourselves, our souls, 
 the truths which we have discovered, our hopes, our 
 loves, our ideals. Goethe says : 
 
 ** It matters not, I ween, 
 
 Where worms our friends consume, 
 Beneath the turf so green, 
 
 Or 'neath the marble tomb. 
 Remember ye who live, 
 
 Though frowns the fleeting day, 
 That to your friends you give 
 What never will decay." 
 
 — Translated by Edgar Alfred Bowring. 
 
 " Und wo die Freunde faulen, 
 
 Das ist ganz einerlei, 
 Ob unter Marmor-Saulen 
 
 Oder im Rasen frei. 
 Der Lebende bedenke, 
 
 Wenn auch der Tag ihm mault, 
 Dass er den Freunden schenke 
 
 Was nie und nimmer fault." 
 
 Goethe's idea of salvation, as exemplified in 
 Faust, is self-salvation through our own deeds. He 
 says: 
 
 "Yes 1 to this thought I hold with firm persistence ; 
 The last result of wisdom stamps it true : 
 He only earns his freedom and existence, 
 
 Who daily conquers them anew. 
 Then dared I hail the Moment fleeing ; 
 * Ah, 5till delay— thou art so fair ! ' 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 109 
 
 The traces cannot, of mine earthly being, 
 In aeons perish, — they are there ! " 
 
 — Translated by Bayard Taylor, 
 
 " Ja I diesem Sinne bin ich ganz ergeben, 
 
 Das ist der Weisheit letzter Schluss : 
 Nur der verdient sich Freiheit wie das Leben, 
 
 Der taglich sie erobern muss. 
 Zura Augenblicke diirft ich sagen : 
 
 Verweile doch, du bist so schon ! 
 Es kann die Spur von meinen Erdentagen 
 
 Nicht in Aeonen untergehn. — " 
 
 Life possesses no intrinsic value : the worth of a 
 man depends entirely upon himself. Says Goethe : 
 
 "Thy worth wouldst thou have recognized? 
 Give to the world a worth that's prized 1 " 
 
 *' Willst du dich deines Werthes freuen, 
 So musst der Welt du Werth verleihen." 
 
 The Buddhist's Nirvana is the obliteration of the 
 ego-illusion ; it is the annihilation of the error of 
 selfhood, but not annihilation of man's soul or of 
 the world. Nirvana is not death, but life ; it is the 
 right way of living, to be obtained by the conquest 
 of all the passions that becloud the mind. Nirvana 
 is the rest in activity, the tranquillity of a man who 
 has risen above himself and has learned to view life 
 in its eternal aspects. True rest is not quietism, but 
 a well-balanced activity. It is a surrender of self in 
 exchange for the illimitable life of the evolution of 
 truth. It is in our life and life aspirations the en- 
 tire omission of the thought of self, of the conceit 
 
110 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 " Mark all the world, 'tis I who do this " ; and the 
 surrender of all egotistic petulancy is not (as the 
 egotistic imagine) a resignation, but it is bliss. Says 
 Goethe, in his poem " Eins und Alles " : 
 
 " Into the limitless to sink, 
 No one, I trow, will ever blink. 
 
 For there all sorrow we dismiss. 
 Instead of cravings and wants untold, 
 Fatiguing demands and duties cold, 
 Surrender of one's self is bliss." 
 
 " Im Grenzenlosen sich zu finden, 
 Wird gern der Einzelne verschwinden. 
 
 Da lost sich aller Ueberdruss : 
 Statt heissem Wiinschen, wildem WoUen, 
 Statt last, gem Fordern, strengem SoUen, 
 Sich aufzugeben ist Genuss." 
 
 Contemplation and retirement have their charms 
 and are preferable to the turmoil of a worldly life, 
 and Goethe appreciated the sweetness of seclusion. 
 He said in his " Song to the Moon " : 
 
 " Happy he who, hating none, 
 Leaves the world's dull noise, 
 And, with trusty friends alone, 
 Quietly enjoys 
 
 " What, forever unexpressed, 
 Hid from common sight. 
 Through the mazes of the breast 
 Softly steals by night ! " 
 
 — Translated by J. S. Dvnght. 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. Ill 
 
 " Selig, wer sich vor der Welt 
 Ohne Hass verschliesst, 
 Einen Freund am Busen halt 
 Und mit dem geniesst, 
 
 " "Was, von Menschen nicht gewusst, 
 Oder nicht gedacht, 
 Durch das Labyrinth der Bnist 
 Wandelt in der Nacht." 
 
 Such being Goethe's view of the soul and the as- 
 pirations of man, as expressed in his own verses, we 
 shall find it natural that his God-conception is more 
 like Amitabha than like Zeus or Yahveh. Goethe's 
 God is not an individual being ; not a person. He 
 says: 
 
 " Why do you scoff and scout 
 About the All and One ? 
 The professor's a person, no doubt, 
 God is none." 
 
 " Was soil mir euer Hohn 
 Ueber das All und Eine ? 
 Der Professor ist eine Person, 
 Gott ist keine." 
 
 Nor does Goethe expect help from heaven; he 
 has learned to rely on himself. He makes Prome- 
 theus say : 
 
 " When in my childhood 
 I knew not where to turn. 
 My seeking eyes strayed sunward, 
 As though there were in heaven 
 An ear to listen to my prayer, 
 A heart like mine, 
 To feel for my distress compassion. 
 
112 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHKISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 *' Who helped me 
 Against the Titan's insolence ? 
 And who delivered me from death? 
 Didst thou not rescue thee, thyself, 
 My holy, glowing heart, 
 In goodness and in youth 
 Aglow with gratitude, deceived, 
 For the slumb'ring God above I " 
 
 "Da ich ein Kind war, 
 Nicht wusste, wo aus noch ein, 
 Kehrt' ich mein verirrtes Auge 
 Zur Sonne, als wenn driiber war* 
 Ein Ohr, zu horen meine Klage, 
 Ein Herz, wie meins, 
 Sich des Bedrangten zu erbarmen. 
 
 " War half mir 
 Wider der Titanen Uebermut ? 
 Wer rettete vom Tode mich, 
 Von Sklaverei ? 
 
 Hast du nicht alles selbst vollendet, 
 Heilig gliihend Herz ? 
 Und gluhtest jung und gut, ' 
 
 Betrogen, Rettungsdank 
 Dem Schlafenden da droben I " 
 
 Goethe's God is the eternal in the transient, the 
 immutable in the change and the rest that the 
 thoughtful will discover in the ever agitated evolu- 
 tion of circling worlds : God, in a word, is the cos- 
 mic Nirvana, the rest in unrest, the peace in strife, 
 and the bliss that is attained in the tribulations of 
 noble aspirations. Goethe says : 
 
 ** When in the infinite appeareth 
 The same eternal repetition. 
 When in harmonious coalition 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 113 
 
 A mighty dome its structure reareth ; 
 
 A rapture thrills through all existence 
 All stars, or great or small are blessed, 
 
 Yet all the strife and all resistance 
 In God, the Lord's eternal rest." 
 
 " Wenn im Unendlichen dasselbe 
 
 Sich wiederholend ewig fliesst, 
 Das tausendfaltige Gewolbe 
 
 Sich kraf tig in einander schliesst, 
 Stromt Lebenslust aus alien Dingen, 
 
 Dem kleinsten wie dem grdssten Stem, 
 Und alles Drangen, alles Ringen 
 
 Ist ewige Ruh in Gott dem Herm.** 
 
 Whatever Buddha's doctrines may have been, 
 this much is sure, that the principle of Buddhism is 
 the same as the principle of the Keligion of Science ; 
 for Buddhism is the religion of enlightenment, and 
 enlightenment means a perfect comprehension of 
 the significance of life in matters of religion. On 
 this point, too, Goethe expressed himself in unequiv- 
 ocal terms. He equals in breadth Buddhism, and 
 thus did not reject the Christian religion, but only 
 refused to be limited by the narrowTiess of its dog- 
 matism. Goethe accepted the truths which Chris- 
 tianity had given to the world ; and mark the 
 reason why he accepts them : Because they cannot 
 be claimed as the exclusive possession of a sect, but 
 are the heirloom of all mankind, therefore, he con- 
 tends, the " scientist " has a right to them ; and 
 identifying his right with that of the scientist, 
 Goethe claims them for himself. 
 8 
 
114 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Addressing the Christian believers, Goethe says : 
 
 " Ye faithful, do not claim that your confession 
 Be truth alone ; for we have faith like you. 
 Science can't be deprived of the possession 
 Belonging to the world, and to me too." 
 
 " Ihr Glaubigen ! riihmt nur nicht euern Glauben 
 Als einzigen : wir glauben auch wie ihr ; 
 Der Forscher lasst sich keineswegs berauben 
 Des Erbtheils, aller Welt gegonnt— und mir." 
 
 How near Goethe, the scientist {Forscher\ comes 
 in these lines to calling his faith " the religion of 
 science " ! 
 
 The fact that Goethe's conception of the soul is 
 in perfect agreement with Buddha's teachings, is the 
 more remarkable as Goethe was not familiar even 
 with the mere outlines of the Buddhistic Abhidharma. 
 
 There are many similar agreements that can be 
 traced between Buddhism and the tenets of modern 
 science, especially psychology ; and this is not at all 
 surprising, for Buddhism is a religion which recog- 
 nizes no other revelation except the truth that can 
 be proved by science. Buddha teaches his disciples 
 to contemplate the facts of life without distorting 
 them by postulates or metaphysical assumptions. 
 His religion is the most radical freethought, that 
 blinks no consequences nor allows anyone to be mis- 
 guided by phantasms of the heart ; yet at the same 
 time, it is the most earnest devotion to truth, for the 
 salient feature of Buddhism has always been that 
 the surre-^der of the ego-illusion does not remain a 
 mere theory but becomes a maxim of conduct, which 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 115 
 
 induces Buddha's followers to renounce all egotism, 
 to exert themselves in brotherly love and purity of 
 heart, to devote themselves to the welfare of their 
 fellow-creatures, and, above all, to serve the needs of 
 those who toil and suffer. 
 
 Christ taught by example, and in pithy aphorisms 
 and parables, an ethics which closely agrees with 
 Buddhistic ethics ; but he taught no philosophy and 
 no systematic religious dogma. Christ's ethics exhib- 
 its a broad humanitarianism, and the figure of Christ 
 stands before us as the ecce homo — the Son of man, 
 the representative of mankind. The church that 
 developed from the moral movement started by 
 Christ has supplemented the theoretical doctrines 
 which Christ had neglected to teach, but unfortu- 
 nately the dogmatists of the church replaced the broad 
 ecce homo by a narrow ecce ego ; and thus the assump- 
 tions of the ego-psychology have become officially 
 recognized as Christian dogmas. Yet I venture to 
 say that those two masters in the world of thought, 
 Buddha and Goethe, are nearer to the spirit of Christ 
 than those who bear his name and call themselves 
 his disciples. If Christian dogmatists w^ould begin 
 to listen to the teachings of science, they might at 
 last be converted to the ethics of their master. 
 
 ADVANTAGES OF SELF-RESIGNATION. 
 
 Both Buddhism and Christianity inculcate in 
 strong terms an ethics of self -resignation, and 
 the Keligion of Science joins them, if not always in 
 
116 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 the letter, certainly in the spirit of their teachings. 
 It would not be advisable to turn the right cheek to 
 him who smites you on the left cheek, but it is not 
 only moral but also wise to drop in all affairs of life 
 the motive of selfishness. 
 
 The surrender of the thought " I am," appears at 
 first sight very impracticable, and we hear much of 
 the importance of personal ambition and even vanity 
 as a spring prompting people to great achievements. 
 But when we inquire into the cause of the success 
 of any man, we find it — whatever be his ultimate 
 motives — invariably based upon direct application 
 to the work to be performed, joined to an utter neg- 
 lect of all personal preferences, pleasures, or consid- 
 erations. 
 
 Take, for instance, that greatest of all egotists. 
 Napoleon Bonaparte, who would deserve the name 
 the Great if his greatness were not dwarfed by the 
 puniness of his motives. Napoleon pursued his am- 
 bitious purpose, which was the acquisition of power, 
 without consulting his personal welfare. He ex- 
 posed his life courageously to the bullets of the Aus- 
 trians on the bridge at Lodi, and faced death un- 
 flinchingly in many bloody battles. And in estab- 
 lishing his power he looked out for the needs of the 
 people. Whatever wrongs he may have done, his 
 sins are by far outnumbered by the blessings which 
 for the consolidation of his power he conferred upon 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 117 
 
 mankind. The reformation alone of the laws, which 
 was carried out in the Code Napoleon^ amply atoned 
 for the tyranny which he exercised for a number of 
 years over Europe. He further abolished a number 
 of mediaeval institutions which the legitimate rulers 
 would never have dared to touch from fear that the 
 principle of legitimacy might thereby be weakened. 
 The biographies of Napoleon are mostly narratives of 
 his life from a partisan standpoint ; an objective ap- 
 preciation of his greatness can only be written by 
 him who is able to trace the services which Kapoleon 
 rendered mankind by administering to the demands 
 of the time and devoting his influence to the practi- 
 cal and correct solution of burning questions with- 
 out consulting his own self. Napoleon was person- 
 ally vain, but he suppressed his vanity ; he loved 
 women, but he knew it, and watched himself in the 
 presence of beautiful women. He offended the 
 young Queen of Prussia, because he was afraid of 
 her beauty and feared her influence over himself. 
 He grew careless only when he imagined that he had 
 won the world, and the keen-eyed Czar of Kussia 
 duped him in the conference at Erfurt by the baldest 
 flattery. Pretending to admire him, the Czar said 
 about the French Emperor, " If I were a woman, I 
 would fall in love with him," and took care that this 
 remark should be reported. The idea that the Czar 
 was dazzled with the brilliancy of his genius blinded 
 Napoleon to the extent that he thought the Czar 
 would never dare to resist his armies, and, when the 
 war with Kussia broke out, he expected to overawe 
 
118 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 him with rapid victories. The vanity in which 
 Napoleon indulged proved fatal to his career. It 
 marks the turning point in the curve of his life with 
 which its descent begins. 
 
 The partial success of criminals is mostly, if not 
 always, due to self-control and to a temporary sup- 
 pression of the thought of self. 
 
 OMAB KHAYYAM. 
 
 Even he who in this world of sorrow would live 
 for pleasure can do so only by a resolute resignation 
 of his selfhood. He must harden his heart, and be 
 indifferent about his personal fate and the transiency 
 of the pleasures he loves. This is best illustrated in 
 the Kubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, the poet of wine 
 and love. He sings : 
 
 " There was the Door to which I found no key ; 
 There was the Veil through which I could not see : 
 Some little talk awhile of Me and Thee 
 There was, — and then no more of Thee and Me, 
 
 *' And if the wine you drink, the lip you press, 
 End in what All begins and ends in, — yes ; 
 Think then you are To-day what Yesterday 
 You were, — ^To-morrow you shall not be less. 
 
 " Waste not your hour, nor in the vain pursuit 
 Of this and that endeavor and dispute ; 
 Better be jocund with the fruitful grape 
 Than sadder after none or bitter fruit. 
 
 ** Ah, make the most of what we yet may spend, 
 Before we, too, into the dust descend ; 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PKOBLEM. 119 
 
 Dust into dust, and under dust to lie, 
 
 Sans wine, sans song, sans singer, and sans end." 
 
 He who identifies himself with his bodily incarna- 
 tion sees his future in the dust of his remains ; but 
 even then in order to enjoy pleasure he must resign 
 himself and take the fleeting moment, laughing to 
 scorn the fate that awaits him. 
 
 Omar Khayyam's verses are beautiful in them- 
 selves as they stand in Fitzgerald's translation, but 
 their philosophical meaning is brought out with 
 great force in Tedder's illustrations. 
 
 A similar idea, only expressed with greater force 
 and showing more manliness, is expressed by Goethe 
 in his Vanitas Yanitatum Yanitas. The hero of 
 the poem is an old, one-legged soldier who is the 
 merriest comrade in the jovial circle of carousers. 
 He says : * 
 
 " My trust in nothing now is placed, 
 Hurrah ! 
 So in the world true joy I taste, 
 
 Hurrah ! 
 Then he who would be a comrade of mine 
 Must clink his glass, and in chorus combine 
 And drink his cup of wine. 
 
 " I placed my trust in gold and wealth, 
 Hurrah ! 
 But then I lost all joy and health, 
 Lack-a-day ! 
 
 * A revised version of Edgar Alfred Bowring's translation. 
 
120 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Both here and there the moDey roll'd, 
 And when I had it here, behold, 
 There disappeared the gold ! 
 
 ** I placed my trust in women next, 
 
 Hurrah I 
 But there in truth was I sorely vex'd, 
 
 Lack-a-day ! 
 The False another lover sought, 
 The True with tediousness was fraught, 
 The Blest could not be bought. 
 
 " I trusted in travel and started to roam, 
 
 Hurrah I 
 Cast off the habits of my home, 
 
 Lack-a-day ! 
 But not a single thing seem'd good, 
 The beds were bad, and strange the food, 
 And I not understood. 
 
 " In honor trusted I and fame, 
 
 Hurrah ! 
 Another put me straight to shame, 
 
 Lack-a-day ! 
 And when I had achieved advance 
 The people looked at me askance. 
 With none I had a chance. 
 
 *' I placed my trust in war and fight, 
 
 Hurrah ! 
 We gain'd full many a victory bright. 
 
 Hurrah 1 
 Into the foeman's land we cross'd, 
 Alas, though, at our triumph's cost I 
 For there a leg I lost. 
 
 " In nothing now my trust shall be, 
 Hurrah ! 
 And all the world belongs to me, 
 Hurrah 1 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 121 
 
 And as we end our feast and strain, 
 The cup we'll to the bottom drain ; 
 Let nowhere dregs remain 1 " 
 
 Goethe's poem appears at first sight frivolous, but 
 its apparent levity conceals a rare moral courage, 
 which was a trait of the poet's own character. 
 
 SELFHOOD AN ILLUSION. 
 
 Self-resignation is the indispensable condition of 
 success, but as soon as self-resignation becomes com- 
 plete, when it rests upon a clear Qpnception of the 
 non-existence of a separate self and utter futility, nay, 
 vanity of selfhood, it therewith ceases to be a resigna- 
 tion, and becomes an exaltation. 
 
 It is no longer a submission of one's own person- 
 ality under a higher authority, but it is the rescission 
 of the limits of one's own being and a vindication of 
 one's own personality as limitless in both time and 
 space. It becomes, to use the language of Tauler 
 and Jacob Bohme, a perfect union with God and 
 makes man feel the thrill of the divine spirit that be- 
 got his soul. This state is no more a surrender, it is 
 the acquisition of enlightenment with all its bliss. It 
 is ecstasy ; not a fitful rapture but a calm serenity of 
 imperturbable peace. It is no longer an abdication 
 of selfhood, it has become a conquest of death. 
 
 Selfishness would be the right policy in life if we 
 were genuine and true selves, but we are not. 
 
 When the awakening consciousness begins to illu- 
 
122 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 mine all those functions of sense and thought activity 
 which are the product of an ancestral karma, which 
 is the pre-natal history that produced us, every- 
 thing appears so new that the illusion of an at man, 
 a self-individuality, is quite natural, and the thought- 
 less are fain to join in the declamations of Wagner, 
 the overbearing disciple of Faust, when he says : 
 
 " This is Youth's noblest calling and most fit I 
 The world was not, ere I created it; 
 The sun I drew from out the Orient sea ; 
 The moon began her changeful course with me ; 
 The Day put on his shining robes, to greet me ; 
 The Earth grew green, and burst in flower to meet me ; 
 And when I becKoned, from the primal night 
 The stars unveiled their splendors to my sight, 
 Who, save myself, to you deliverance brought 
 From commonplaces of restricted thought ? 
 I, proud and free, even as dictates my mind, 
 Follow with joy the inward light I find, 
 And speed along in mine own ecstasy. 
 Darkness behind, the Glory leading me 1 " 
 
 It is not "the inward light " that gives us reliable 
 information, but the facts of experience. The reve- 
 lation of truth comes in to us from without, and " the 
 light within " is only a reflection of the All, whose 
 image we are. A man who, like Wagner, imagines 
 in his self-conceit that he only made the sun to rise 
 in the world, is not likely to perform useful work. 
 He clings to the separateness of his present embodi- 
 ment as his true self, and loses sight of the actual 
 constituents of his being. He will try to acquire 
 fame, but will not perform the work that would 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 123 
 
 entitle him to it. He identifies himself with the 
 abstract and empty idea of his being, of himself, 
 and forgets over it the realities of which it consists. 
 He may accomplish his ends, and what would in that 
 case be the result? His name, not his real soul, 
 would continue to live and be linked with the 
 achievements of others. His name ! And what is 
 his name ? A mere word ! 
 
 The instance of the preservation of the thought 
 of one man under the name of another is sufficiently 
 instructive to deserve discussion of one flagrant 
 instance, as which we select the case of Hooke 
 against Newton. 
 
 HOOKE OR NEWTON. 
 
 "We do not intend to decide the priority claims of 
 Hooke versus Newton in the formulation of the law 
 of gravitation as expressed by the inverse square of 
 the distance, because an exhaustive presentation of 
 the case is no easy matter and would take more space 
 than we can spare. 
 
 Hooke's claim may be considered as well estab- 
 lished, but he must probably blame mainly himself 
 for the ill-treatment he met at the hands of his con- 
 temporaries. He was a man who "originated much 
 but perfected little," he was at the same time " irri- 
 table in his temper," which rendered him among his 
 acquaintances unpopular. Add to this his penurious 
 appearance, his crooked figure, shrunken limbs, dis- 
 hevelled hair, his solitary life, and miserly habits ! 
 
124 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Yet, this unattractive abode harbored the inventive- 
 ness of a genius and the keenness of a great discov- 
 erer. He was instrumental in inventing the air-pump ; 
 it was he who proposed to regulate watch movements 
 by balance springs ; he urged the advantage of tele- 
 scopic sight over plain sight in surveying ; he pro- 
 pounded valuable theories about the composition of 
 the air, which "foreshadowed the discoveries of 
 Priestley." Next to Tycho Brahe he has the best 
 claim to being regarded as the inventor of the sex- 
 tant. He stated the law of tension and force in the 
 terse formula ut tensio sic vis, which is still called 
 " Hooke's law." (See Encyclojpmdia Britannica, III., 
 64; Y., 461; YIL, 803; XXIL, 595; and XVIL, 
 442.) 
 
 The Encydopoedia Britannica contains a notice 
 of Hooke's claims, from which we extract the fol- 
 lowing passage : 
 
 " Hooke was offended because Sir John did not mention 
 what he had told him of his own discovery. Halley only com- 
 municated to Newton the fact ' that Hooke had some preten- 
 sions to the invention of the rule for the decrease of gravity 
 being reciprocally as the squares of the distances from the 
 centre,' acknowledging at the same time that, though Newton 
 had the notion from him, *yet the demonstration of the 
 curves generated thereby belonged wholly to Newton.' ' How 
 much of this,' Halley adds, ' is so, you know best, so likewise 
 what you have to do in this matter ; only Mr. Hooke seems to 
 expect you should make some mention of him in the preface, 
 which 'tis possible you may see reason to prefix. I must beg 
 your pardon that 'tis I that send you this ungrateful account ; 
 but I thought it my duty to let you know it, so that you 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 125 
 
 might act accordingly, being in myself fully satisfied that 
 nothing but the greatest candor imaginable is to be expected 
 from a person who has of all men the least need to borrow 
 reputation.' 
 
 •' In thus appealing to Newton's candor, Halley obviously 
 wished that some acknowledgment of Hooke should be made. 
 He knew indeed that before Newton had announced the in- 
 verse law, Hooke and Wren and himself had spoken of it and 
 discussed it, and therefore justice demanded that, though 
 none of them had given demonstration of the law, Hooke 
 especially should receive credit for having maintained it as 
 a truth of which he was seeking the demonstration." 
 
 Newton at last consented to insert this concession 
 as an addition to his fourth proposition : 
 
 " The inverse law of gravity holds in all celestial motions, 
 as was discovered also independently by my countrymen 
 Wren, Hooke, and Halley." 
 
 Newton claims that he had thought of the solution 
 sixteen years before he began to work it out in his 
 Principia^ but had rejected the idea on account of the 
 objections which were solved only by the discovery 
 of the flattened condition of the poles. Schopenhauer 
 says : " No man who has found a new theory will on 
 account of some slight obstacle reject and forget it 
 for sixteen years. That is not the treatment which we 
 give to the children of our own thought, but to step- 
 children or foundlings. As to our OAvn theories, we are 
 in the habit of trying them over and over again, until 
 we find some ground on which they can be justified. 
 Poor Hooke," adds Schopenhauer, " he had the same 
 fate as Columbus. America is the name of the con- 
 
126 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 tinent which he discovered, and we speak of ISTew- 
 ton's law of gravitation." 
 
 If E^ewton had been the great thinker and discov- 
 erer which he is reputed to be, it would indeed be 
 strange that he was proud of the silly commentary 
 he had written on the Eevelation of St. John. 
 
 Now, suppose we accept the view of Schopen- 
 hauer concerning the priority claims of Hooke, does 
 not Hooke's thought live on, whether or not the 
 honor of priority is attributed to Newton ? Is it 
 not simply as though Hooke had written under 
 the nora de plume of Isaac Newton ? It is, after all, 
 his actual soul that marches down triumphantly with 
 the mark of truth through the ages and is reincar- 
 nated in many thousands of scientists. The actual 
 soul of a man, which alone can properly be called 
 his own, is not his name, but consists in the thought- 
 forms, sentiment forms, and deed-forms which origi- 
 nate in him. They are characteristic of him as the 
 peculiar product of an interaction among those other 
 soul-forms of his which constitute his inheritance 
 from former ages. 
 
 He who seeks his self and is anxious to preserve 
 it in its separateness, will surely fail, for his present 
 individuality will at last be dissolved in death. He 
 who attempts to immortalize his name, may or may 
 not succeed. A name, the combination of letters in 
 the mouth of posterity, is in itself an empty thing, 
 and for that reason it is sometimes more lasting than 
 our bodily organization. But he who endeavors to 
 be an incarnation of the truth, and nothing else be- 
 
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROBLEM. 127 
 
 sides, is sure to succeed ; he will not be hampered by 
 other considerations ; he has attained immortality, 
 and his soul in its peculiar personal idiosyncrasy will 
 be, and will forever remain, a most valuable presence, 
 a never-failing blessing, in the advancing and grow- 
 ing spirit of the human race. 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 
 
 ■pUDDHISM is generally characterized as a religion 
 -^ without a belief in God and the human soul, 
 without the hope of a future existence, pessimistic 
 and desolate, looking upon life as an ocean of suffer- 
 ing, quietistic in ethics, and finding comfort only in 
 the expectation of a final extinction in nothingness. 
 Now, it is true that Buddhists, with the exception of 
 some less important heretical sects, do not believe in 
 a personal God ; but, while on the one hand, there are 
 many faithful Christians who look upon the theistic 
 dogma merely as the sj^mbolical expression of a 
 deeper truth, on the other hand, the Buddhists 
 believe not only in the Sambhoga Kaya which is an 
 equivalent of the Christian God-idea, but even in a 
 trinity of Sambhoga Kaya, Nirmana Kaya, and 
 Dharma Kaya, bearing a close resemblance to the 
 Christian conception of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. 
 Further, it is undeniable that Buddhists do not be- 
 lieve in the atman or Self which is the Brahman 
 philosophers' definition of soul, but they do not deny 
 the existence of mind and the continuance of man's 
 spiritual existence after death. Men trained in West- 
 ern modes of thought, however, are so accustomed 
 
 to their own terminology that Eastern thinkers, when 
 128 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 129 
 
 using expressions denying the allegoric terras of 
 Christian thought, are suspected of negativism. 
 Even Western thinkers who have ceased to be be- 
 lievers in Christianity fail to see the positive aspect 
 of the Buddhist world-conception, and we are again 
 and again confronted with the refrain : If Buddha's 
 doctrine is not nihilism, it practically amounts to 
 nihilism. 
 
 Benfey says in the preface to his translation of the 
 " Pantscha Tantra " : 
 
 *' The very bloom of the intellectual life of India (whether it 
 found expression it Brahmanical or Buddhist works) proceeded 
 substantially from Buddhism, and is contemporaneous with the 
 epoch in which Buddhism flourished ; — that is to say, from the 
 third century before Christ to the sixth century after Christ. 
 Taking its stand upon that principle, said to have been pro- 
 claimed by Buddhism in its earliest years, ' that only that teach- 
 ing of the Buddha's is true which contraveneth not sound 
 reason,' * the autonomy of man's Intellect was, we may fairly 
 say, effectively acknowledged ; the whole relation between the 
 realms of the knowable and of the unknowable was subjected 
 to its control ; and notwithstanding that the actual reason- 
 ing powers, to which the ultimate appeal was thus given, were 
 in fact then not altogether sound, yet the way was pointed out 
 by which Reason could, under more favorable circumstances, 
 begin to liberate itself from its failings. We are already learn- 
 ing to value, in the philosophical endeavors of Buddhism, the 
 labors, sometimes indeed quaint, but aiming at thoroughness 
 and worthy of the highest respect, of its severe earnestness in 
 inquiry. From the prevailing tone of our work, and still more 
 so from the probable Buddhist origin of those other Indian 
 story-books which have hitherto become known to us, it is 
 clear that, side by side with Buddhistic earnestness, the merry 
 
 *Wassiliew, Der Buddhismus, etc., p. 
 9 
 
130 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 jests of light, and even frivolous poetry and conversation, 
 preserved the cheerfulness of life." 
 
 This description does not show Buddhism in a 
 gloomy light, and it is different from what people 
 usually imagine it to be. 
 
 In spite of the innumerable exuberances of modern 
 Buddhism, its power and possibilities are still great, 
 mainly because it enjoins on its devotees the free 
 exercise of their reasoning powers. Among all 
 religious men Buddhists more than others appear to 
 be at the same time full of religious zeal and also 
 open to conviction. 
 
 We read in M. Hue's Travels in Tartary, Thibet 
 and China (II., p. 189) that the Regent of Lhasa 
 incessantly repeated to the French missionaries : 
 
 ** * Your religion is like our own, the truths are the same ; we 
 diflFer only in the explanation. Amid all that you have seen 
 and heard in Tartary and Thibet you must have found much 
 to condemn ; but you are to remember that many errors and 
 superstitions that you may have observed, have been intro- 
 duced by ignorant Lamas, but are rejected by intelligent 
 Buddhists.' He admitted between us and himself only two 
 points where there was disagreement — the origin of the world 
 and the transmigration of souls. * Let us examine them both 
 together,' said he to them again, * with care and sincerity ; if 
 yours is the best, we will accept it ; how could we refuse you ? 
 If, on the other hand, ours is best, I doubt not you will be alike 
 reasonable, and follow that.' " 
 
 Now it is strange that in those two points which 
 constitute the main differences between Buddhism 
 and Christianity, viz., creation and the nature of the 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OP BUDDHISM. 131 
 
 soul, modern science, represented exclusively by 
 scientists educated in Christian schools and with a 
 Christian tradition of two millenniums, will certainly 
 side with Buddhism. There is scarcely any one 
 among our scientists who would be willing to en- 
 dorse a creation out of nothing, and among our 
 prominent psychologists few only will be found who 
 adhere to the dualistic soul-conception which as- 
 sumes the existence of a psychic agent behind the 
 facts of soul-life. Nevertheless our popular concep- 
 tion of a Creator-God and an ego-soul are so deeply 
 rooted in the minds of our people that, as a rule, 
 they still consider these two ideas as the indispen- 
 sable foundations of all religion. 
 
 We intend here briefly to review the fundamental 
 conceptions of Buddhism, and hope to prove that 
 although its doctrines of the soul and of Nirvana 
 may to Western minds appear to be the equivalent 
 of nihilism, they certainly are not nihilism if we take 
 the trouble to look at them from the Buddhist stand- 
 point. And far from being pessimistic in the 
 Western sense of pessimism, the Buddhist possesses 
 a cheerful disposition which in this world of tribula- 
 tion lifts him above pain and suffering. 
 
 KAEMA. 
 
 Soul was identified by Brahmanical philosophers, 
 as we have learned in a previous article, with the at- 
 man, the self, the ego, or the ego-consciousness, viz., 
 that something in man which says " I." This atman 
 
132 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 was conceived as a metaphysical entity behind man's 
 sensations, thoughts, and other activities. lN"ot the 
 eye sees, they said, but the seer in the eye ; not the 
 ear hears, but the hearer in the ear ; not the tongue 
 tastes, but the taster in the tongue ; not the nose 
 smells, but the smeller in the nose ; not the mind 
 thinks, but the thinker in the mind ; not the feet 
 walk and the hands act, but the actor in the hands 
 and the feet. The mysterious being in man which 
 says " I am this person, I possess eyes, ears, nose, 
 tongue, hands and feet, I see, hear, smell, taste, feel 
 the contact of bodies, walk and act," is said to be 
 the agent of man's activity. This " I " or the ego of 
 the soul, the agent of man's activity, is called the 
 atman or self ; and in so far as the existence of the 
 atman is denied by Buddha, Buddhism teaches that 
 there is no soul. 
 
 When Buddhists speak of the soul, they mean the 
 Brahmanical atman. When they mean what we 
 would call soul, they speak of mind ; and Buddhism, 
 far from denying the existence of mind, only replaces 
 the dualistic conception of Brahmanical philosophy 
 by a monistic soul-theory, which in the course of 
 time naturally developed the doctrine that there is 
 nothing but mind. 
 
 The phrase " there is nothing but mind," reminds 
 us of Clifford's dictum: Everything that exists is 
 mind-stuff ; and it may be explained as follows : All 
 outside things appear to us as matter moving in 
 space ; so we appear to other beings as matter 
 moving in space ; we appear to be body to our own 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 133 
 
 and to other people's senses ; but in ourselves we 
 feel our existence as that which we call mind or soul. 
 Body is that as which mind or soul appears. Our 
 body consisting of the same material as the things 
 of the surrounding world and having originated 
 therefrom, we conclude that all the world consists 
 of the same material. All that which appears to us 
 as matter can, if it but assume the proper form, be- 
 come such minds or souls as we are ; in a word ; all 
 existence is spiritual, or more exactly speaking, 
 psychical.* 
 
 The psychology of Buddhism is briefly laid down 
 in the first verse of the Dhammapada : 
 
 "All that we are, is the result of what we have thought : it 
 is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts." 
 
 This shows that Buddhism does not deny the ex- 
 
 * In a partial accommodation to the translators' usage of 
 terms, who, as a rule, render dtman by " soul " and that 
 which we would call *' soul," i. e., the totality of our thoughts, 
 sensations, and aspirations by *' mind," we speak here of 
 " soul or mind." Otherwise, and according to a stricter usage 
 of terms, we propose to make a distinction. When speaking 
 of ** soul," we mean mainly the feeling or sentient element of 
 man's existence ; when of mind, we think mainly of the intel- 
 lectual and rational features with which the various feelings 
 are endowed. Thus it would have been more proper for Clif- 
 ford to say ** soul-stuff" instead of "mind-stuff;" and the 
 Buddhist doctrine, " everything is mind," should be expressed 
 in the sentence : " Every reality which appears to sentient 
 beings as objective, is in itself subjective ; we call it matter, 
 but it is in itself potential feeling ; it can become sentient, it 
 is soul, or better, soul-stuff." For details as to definitions of 
 *' soul " and " mind " see Primer of Philosophy, p. 193. 
 
134 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS . 
 
 istence of the soul, if by soul is meant man's ideas, 
 aspirations, and mental activities. Buddhists declare 
 that man's soul is not an indissoluble unit, not a 
 metaphysical self, but a compound. Man's physical 
 and spiritual being consists of samskaras,* i. e., of 
 certain forms and formative faculties which, accord- 
 ing to the law of Karma, are preserved and thus 
 condition the continuity of his existence in the whirl 
 of constant changes. Oldenberg translates the word 
 samskara by Gestaltung, and says in explanation of 
 the term p. 242, Engl. Transl.) : 
 
 **We might translate Samkhara directly by * actions' if we 
 understand this word in the wide sense in which it includes 
 also, at the same time, the internal actions, the will and the 
 wish." 
 
 Samskara denotes soul structure, manifesting itself 
 in functions as the formative element which shapes 
 our existence and destiny. Oldenberg continues : 
 
 '* Buddhism teaches : * My action is my possession, my action 
 is my inheritance, my action is the womb which bears me, 
 my action is the race to which I am akin, my action is my 
 refuge.' (Anguttara Nik&ya, Pancaka Nipata.) What appears 
 to man to be his body is in truth ' the action of his past state 
 which then assuming a form, realised through his endeavor, 
 has become endowed with a tangible existence.' " 
 
 The Jewish-Christian world-conception represents 
 us as the creatures of God. We are like vessels in 
 the potter's hand ; some of us are made for noble 
 
 * " Samskara" is Sanskrit, '* Sawkhdra " or " Samkhdra " is 
 PaU. 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 135 
 
 purposes, others as vessels of impurity. Buddhists 
 look upon our character and fate as the result of our 
 own doings in our present and innumerable past ex- 
 istences. In this sense the Dhammapada * says : 
 
 " By oneself the evil is done ; by oneself one suffers. 
 
 By oneself evil is left undone ; by oneself one is purified. 
 
 Purity and impurity belong to oneself, no one can purify 
 another. 
 
 You yourself must make an effort. The Buddhas are only 
 preachers. 
 
 The way was preached by me when I understood the re- 
 moval of the thorn in the flesh." 
 
 According to Buddhist doctrines, the souls of men 
 continue to exist as they are impressed upon other 
 generations by heredity and education. A man re- 
 mains the same from yesterday until to-day, and 
 from to-day until to-morrow, in so far as he consists 
 of the same samskaras; his character remains the 
 same, exactly as a light burning several hours re- 
 mains the same light, although the flame is always 
 fed by other particles of oil.f The man of the same 
 character as you, is the same as you, in somewhat 
 the same sense as two triangles of equal angles and 
 sides are congruent. This is tersely expressed in the 
 saying Tat twam asi^ " That art thou," which Scho- 
 penhauer makes the corner-stone of ethics, for this 
 view of the soul, in which one recognizes oneself in 
 others, removes all motives of selfishness. 
 
 * Sacred Books of the East, Vol. X, pp. 46 and 67. 
 t This simile is used in The Questions of Milinda. 
 
136 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 There are two isolated passages in the Dhamma- 
 pada which apparently are a contradiction of Bud- 
 dha's doctrine of the illusion of self. We read in 
 verse 160 : " Self is the lord of self. "Who else could 
 be the lord "; and in verse 323 : "A man who con- 
 trols himself enters the untrodden land through his 
 own self-controlled self." Prof. Max Mliller, who is 
 himself a champion of the atman doctrine, makes 
 the most of these passages, in proving that Buddha 
 might have taught the existence of self. But his 
 proposition is improbable in the face of so many 
 other unequivocal statements. Moreover, the general 
 meaning of the quoted sentences is unmistakable. 
 There is no reference to the existence of a self in the 
 sense of the Brahmanical atman. The author of 
 these passages — whether Buddha himself, or a Bud- 
 dhist, or, what is not improbable, some thinker older 
 than Buddha — simply means that " by self-control 
 alone man can attain salvation," but we have no 
 right to interpret the words in a sense which would 
 antagonize one of the cardinal doctrines of Bud- 
 dhism. We must bear in mind that Buddha does 
 not deny the existence of the idea of self in man. 
 He only denies the existence of a soul-substratum 
 such as was assumed under the name of self by the 
 most prominent philosophers of his time. Buddha 
 does not deny that there is an ego-consciousness 
 in the soul. He only rejects the assumption that 
 our ego-consciousness is the doer of our acts and 
 the thinker of our thoughts, or a kind of thing-in- 
 itself behind our existence. 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 137 
 
 There are many words which are used in various 
 applications, implying radically different or even 
 contradictory meanings, and the word " self " is in 
 this respect no exception. Generally speaking, self 
 is that idea in a man's mind which represents the 
 totality of his existence, his bodily form, his senses 
 and their activities, his thoughts, his emotions, his 
 likes and dislikes, his aspirations and hopes. Far 
 from proposing to exterminate self in this sense, 
 Buddha's religion preaches the elevation and sancti- 
 fication of every one's self, so much so that Olden- 
 berg characterizes the ethics of Buddhism as self- 
 culture and self -discipline ( " sittliche Arbeit an sich 
 selbst"), as expressed in verse 239 of the Dham- 
 mapada : 
 
 " Let a wise man blow off the impurities of his self as a 
 smith blows off the impurities of silver, one by one, little by 
 little, and from time to time." 
 
 When Buddhists speak of the illusion of self, de- 
 nouncing the idea of self as the main cause of all 
 evil, they mean that erroneous notion which not only 
 hypostatizes the idea of self into an independent be- 
 ing, but even makes of it the metaphysical agent of 
 all our activities. The adoption of this metaphysi- 
 cal self-conception is said to warp all our thoughts 
 and to dim our spiritual vision ; it makes us neglect 
 the true substance of our soul for a mere shadow. 
 
 Buddha, while denying the Brahmanical theory 
 of the atman, offered a new solution of the problem 
 of the soul. Says Khys Davids in his "Hibbert 
 Lectures," p. 29 : 
 
138 BITDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 ** The distinguishing characteristic of Buddhism was that it 
 started a new line, that it looked upon the deepest questions 
 men have to solve from an entirely different standpoint. It 
 swept away from the field of its vision the whole of the great 
 soul-theory which had hitherto so completely filled and domi- 
 nated the minds of the superstitious and the tlioughtful alike. 
 For the first time in the history of the world, it proclaimed a 
 salvation which each man could gain for himself and by him- 
 self, in this world, during this life, without even the least ref- 
 erence to God, or to gods, either great or small. Like the 
 Upanishads, it placed the first importance on knowledge ; but 
 it was no longer a knowledge of God, it was a clear perception 
 of the real nature, as they supposed it to be, of men and things. 
 And it added to the necessity of knowledge, the necessity of 
 purity, of courtesy, of uprightness, of peace, and of a uni- 
 versal love far-reaching, grown great and beyond measure." 
 
 While Self, that hypothetical agent behind the 
 soul, thus disappears in the teachings of Buddhism, 
 the conception soul or mind is not abolished and the 
 idea of soul-transmigration gains a new importance. 
 The pre-Buddhistic notion of a soul flitting about 
 and seeking a new abode in another body was given 
 up by Shakyamuni for the more correct idea of a 
 transfer of the Samskaras according to the law of 
 Karma. Buddhism recognizes the law of Karma 
 as irrefragable and bases upon it the unfailing justice 
 of the moral law. 
 
 Concerning the migration of souls underlying the 
 moral of the Jataka-tales in the "Buddhist Birth 
 Stories," Prof. Khys Davids says in the preface to 
 his translation, p. Ixxv : 
 
 ** The reader must of course avoid the mistake of importing 
 Christian ideas into this Conclusion by supposing that the 
 
THE BASIC COKCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 139 
 
 identity of the persons in the two stories is owing to the pass- 
 age of a ' soul ' from the one to the other. Buddhism does not 
 teach the Transmigration of Souls.* Its doctrine would be 
 better summarised as the Transmigration of Character ; for it 
 is entirely independent of the early and widely-prevalent no- 
 tion of the existence within each human body of a distinct 
 soul, or ghost, or spirit." 
 
 The same author says iu his manual of "Bud- 
 dhism." p. 104 : 
 
 "As one generation dies and gives way to another — the heir 
 of the consequences of all its virtues and all its vices, the ex- 
 act result of pre-existing causes ; so each individual in the long 
 chain of life inherits all, of good or evil, which all its prede- 
 cessors have done or been ; and takes up the struggle towards 
 enlightenment precisely there, where they have left it." 
 
 Speaking of Karma, Professor Davids explains 
 the nature of Buddhism as follows : 
 
 "Most forms of Paganism, past and present, teach men to 
 seek for some sort of happiness here. Most other forms of 
 belief say that this is folly, but the faithful and the holy shall 
 find happiness hereafter, in a better world beyond. Buddhism 
 maintains that the one hope is as hollow as the other ; that 
 the consciousness of self is a delusion ; that the organized be- 
 ing, sentient existence, since it is not infinite, is bound up 
 inextricably with ignorance, and therefore with sin, and 
 therefore with sorrow. ' Drop then this petty foolish longing 
 for personal happiness,' Buddhism would say ! * Here it comes 
 of ignorance, and leads to sin, which leads to sorrow,' and 
 there the conditions of existence are the same, and each new 
 birth will leave you ignorant and finite still. There is nothing 
 eternal ; the very cosmos itself is passing away ; nothing is, 
 everything becomes ; and all that you see and feel, bodily or 
 mentally, of yourself will pass away like everything else; 
 
 I. e., of atmans. 
 
140 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 there will only remain the accumulated result of all your 
 actions, words, and thoughts* Be pure then, and kind, not 
 lazy in thought. Be awake, shake off your delusions, and 
 enter resolutely on the "Path" which will lead you away 
 from these restless, tossing waves of the ocean of life ; — the 
 Path to the Joy and Rest of the Nirvana of Wisdom and 
 Goodness and Peace ! ' " 
 
 Ehys Davids says : " There will only remain the 
 accumulated result of all your actions, words, and 
 thoughts." True ; but why does he say " only " ? 
 The accumulated result of your actions (viz., your 
 samskaras) are your own being. They constitute 
 your mind so long as you live, and there is no self 
 behind them, no ego, no atman, no metaphysical 
 soul-monad. Thus it appears that, according to 
 Buddhist notions, we ourselves continue in the ac- 
 cumulated results of our actions. Since Prof. Ehys 
 Davids fails to bear in mind that our Samskaras are 
 we ourselves, it is perhaps natural that he, although 
 one of the prof oundest of Buddhist scholars, does not, 
 in spite of his perfect knewledge of facts, appreciate 
 the importance of the Buddhistic conception of 
 Karma and the migration of soul. I do not say that 
 he misunderstands this part of the Buddhist doc- 
 trine ; but I say that he does not appreciate it. He 
 continues the passage just quoted : 
 
 ** Strange is it and instructive that all this should have 
 seemed not unattractive these 2,300 years and more to many 
 despairing and earnest hearts — that they should have trusted 
 themselves to the so seeming stately bridge which Buddhism 
 
 * Italics are ours. 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OP BUDDHISM. 141 
 
 has tried to build over the river of the mysteries and sorrows 
 of life. They have been charmed and awed perhaps by the 
 delicate or noble beauty of some of the several stones of which 
 the arch is built ; they have seen that the whole rests on a 
 more or less solid foundation of fact ; that on one side of the 
 keystone is the necessity of justice, on the other the law of 
 causality." 
 
 Then, he adds : 
 
 " But they have failed to see that tlie very keystone itself, 
 the link between one life and another, is a mere word — this 
 wonderful hypothesis, this airy nothing, this imaginary cause 
 beyond the reach of reason — the individualized and indi- 
 vidualising force of Karma. 
 
 Prof. Rhys Davids adds in a foot-note : 
 
 " Individualized, in so far as the result of a man's actions is 
 concentrated in the formation of a second sentient being ; in- 
 dividualizing, in so far as it is the force by which different 
 beings become one individual. In other respects the force of 
 Karma is real enough." 
 
 Modern science teaches that it is function which 
 creates the organ, and, vice versa, the organ is but 
 the visible result of innumerable former functions. 
 This may be considered as a modern restatement of 
 the Buddhist doctrine of the Samkharas. All the 
 seeings of ancestral eyes continue to live in our eyes. 
 Our ancestors are not dead ; they are still here in 
 us ; and by ancestors the-Buddhist understands not 
 only progenitors, but also those who formed our 
 soul Shakyamuni says to his father, that not he and 
 his fathers, the Kings of the Shakya, but the Buddhas 
 of former ages were his ancestry. 
 
142 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 In the name of Buddhism, I venture to make a re- 
 ply to Prof. Ehys Davids : Buddhism has torn down 
 the imaginary fence which separates man's self from 
 other selves. He who fails to see the link between 
 one life and another, or speaks of it as an " airy 
 nothing," still holds to the illusion of self. He who 
 abandons the idea of self must recognise the sameness 
 of two souls consisting of the same Samskaras. 
 Otherwise we ought to deny also the sameness of the 
 " 1 " of to-day and of yesterday. That which con- 
 stitutes the identity of person in one and the same 
 individual is only the continuity and the sameness 
 of his character. The " I " of to-day has to take all 
 the consequences of the actions which the " I " of 
 yesterday performed. Thus the individualized Kar- 
 ma of future times will reap all that which the in- 
 dividualizing Karma of the present time sows. 
 
 And, strange enough, this Buddhistic conception 
 of the soul is quite in harmony with the views of 
 the most prominent psychologists of Europe. 
 
 Since this remark on Prof. Ehys Davids was writ- 
 ten and published in the April number of The Monist 
 for 1894, he has apparently changed his view of the 
 subject and I would have cancelled the whole pas- 
 sage in which I take exception to his statement, did 
 not his former and more popular book remain before 
 the public and continue to exercise a powerful in- 
 fluence ; for he is (and justly so) deemed a great 
 authority on Buddhism. In his latest publication 
 Prof. Ehys Davids, touching upon the same problem, 
 sums the case up in these words ; 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 143 
 
 *' A man thinks he began to be a few years— twenty, forty 
 sixty years — ago. There is some truth in that ; but in a much 
 larger, deeper, truer sense he has been (in the causes of which 
 he is the result) for countless ages in the past ; and those same 
 causes (of which he is the temporary effect) will continue in 
 other like temporary forms through countless ages yet to 
 come. 
 
 •* There is no such thing as an individuality which is per- 
 manent ; even were a permanent individuality to be possible, 
 it would not be desirable, for it is not desirable to be separate. 
 The effort to keep oneself separate may succeed indeed for a 
 time ; but so long as it is successful it involves limitation, and 
 therefore ignorance, and therefore pain. ' No ! it is not sep- 
 arateness you should hope and long for,' says the Buddhist. 
 " it is union — the sense of oneness with all that now is, that 
 has ever been, that can ever be — the sense that shall enlarge 
 the horizon of your being to the limits of the universe, to the 
 boundaries of time and space, that shall lift you up into a new 
 plane far beyond, outside all mean and miserable care for self. 
 Why stand shrinking there ? Give up the fool's paradise of 
 ** This is I," and " This is mine." It is a real fact— the greatest 
 of realities — that you are asked to grasp. Leap forward with- 
 out fear ! You shall find yourself in the ambrosial waters of 
 Nirvana, and sport with the Arahats who have conquered 
 birth and death ! ' 
 
 " This theory of Karma is the doctrine which takes the place 
 in the Buddhist teaching of the very ancient theory of ' souls,' 
 which the Christians have inherited from the savage beliefs 
 of the earliest periods of history. 
 
 " The history of an individual does not begin with his birth, 
 but has been endless ages in the making ; and he cannot sever 
 himself from his surroundings, no, not for an hour. The 
 tiniest snowdrop drops its fairy head just so much and no 
 more, because it is balanced by the universe. It is a snow- 
 drop, not an oak, and just that kind of snowdrop, because it 
 is the outcome of the Karma of an endless series of past exist- 
 ences. It did not begin to be when the flower opened, or 
 when the mother plant first peeped above the ground, or first 
 met the embraces of the sun, or when the bulb began to shoot 
 
144 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 above the soil, or at auy time which you and I can fix. . . . 
 We may put a new and deeper meaning into the words of th e 
 poet: 
 
 " * Our deeds follow us from afar ; 
 
 And what we have been makes us what we are.' '* 
 
 The objection may be urged against the Buddhist 
 conception that we do not choose to look upon tin^ 
 men who in future times will represent the inciir 
 nation of our Karma as identical with ourselves ; we 
 prefer to look upon them as altogether different 
 beings. But here the Buddhists will have the ad- 
 vantage. The identity obtains whether it be rec- 
 ognized or not. It is real, for the laws of nature 
 recognize it ; it is an established fact. These future 
 incarnations of our Karma inherit our character, 
 together with all its blessings and its curses, in the 
 same way as " I " of to-day am benefited or ham- 
 pered by my actions from the days of my childhood, 
 it matters little whether I choose to recognize the 
 identity of myself or not. 
 
 "We can have no proper conception of the action 
 of the moral law until we understand the interco- 
 herence of soul-life. So long as we cut it up into 
 selves, we shall never cease to be puzzled with psy- 
 chical, philosophical, and moral problems which ap- 
 pear insolvable and incomprehensible. 
 
 The great majority of people who consider them- 
 selves as orthodox Christians are no doubt believers 
 in the atman theory of the soul, postulating a self 
 as the agent behind soul-life and looking upon it as 
 the soul-proper ; yet the great representative au- 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 145 
 
 thorities of Christian orthodoxy, such men as the 
 Apostle St. Paul, Thomas Aquinas, Eckhart, Tauler, 
 Ignatius Loyola, Tholuck, and many others show 
 strong tendencies to the doctrine of anatman, or the 
 surrender of the self as the soul proper. Christians 
 are shocked at the nihilism of the Buddhist whose 
 highest aspiration it is to root out his soul, viz., his 
 ^tman or self, in order to attain JS'irvana and be- 
 come a Buddha, but they take no offence when St. 
 Paul says : " I am crucified with Christ, yet not 1 
 but Christ liveth in me." 
 
 NIRVANA 
 
 We have learned that it is as natural as it is erro- 
 neous for men exclusively trained in Western modes 
 of thought, to look upon the principal doctrine of 
 Buddhist psychology as a bare and flat denial of the 
 soul. In the same way and for similar reasons it is 
 as natural as it erroneous for western minds edu- 
 cated in Christian schools to look upon the Nirvana 
 of Buddhism as an annihilation, and to characterize 
 Buddhist ethics as quietism. 
 
 JSTirvana, the ideal goal of the fully enlightened 
 disciple of Buddha, is the most important term in 
 the religious system of Buddhism ; it is the corner- 
 stone of the whole structure, and yet, judging from 
 the various interpretations of the word and the con- 
 troversies that have been waged about its meaning, 
 its application must be either very ambiguous, or it 
 contains great difficulties for Western minds, 
 19 
 
146 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 The common definition of " Mrvana " among all 
 Buddhists is " deliverance," viz., deliverance from 
 evil, or salvation. The question is, what is the na- 
 ture of this deliverance ? 
 
 The etymology of the word is obvious enough 
 IS'irvana means " extinction," viz., the " extinction of 
 self," which is generally supposed to be the defini- 
 tion of the term given by the Hinayana school of 
 the old southern Buddhism.* Those representa- 
 tives of the Mahay ana school of Japan, however, 
 who visited the World's Parliament of Eeligions, 
 are wont to describe Nirvana as " the complete at- 
 tainment of truth." In their conception, Mrvana 
 is attained by the extinction of the illusion of self, 
 with all it implies, covetousness, lust, and all sinful 
 desires. 
 
 The main issue of all the discussions concerning 
 the term Nirvana is the problem whether it must 
 be conceived as a positive or a negative state of ex- 
 
 * Northern Buddhists make a distinction between Hinayana 
 or "small vehicle" (viz., of salvation) and Mahayana or 
 "great vehicle" ; the former is the Southern, the latter the 
 Northern school of Buddhist thought ; the former prefers to 
 some extent negative and philosophically strict definitions, 
 while the latter aims at positive and religious expressions ; 
 the former represents upon the whole more faithfully the his- 
 torical traditions of Buddha, while the latter, in their aspira- 
 tion to extend salvation to the broad masses of mankind, have 
 admitted many fantastical elements. We must add, how- 
 ever, that these contrasts are in reality not so sweeping as 
 they appear in a general formula, and the distinction of the 
 Hinayana and the Mahayana, altliough very convenient for 
 certain purposes, is admissible only within certain limits, 
 
TH'i: BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 147 
 
 istence, as an eternal rest or a life in paradise, as a 
 complete annihilation or the bliss of absolute perfec- 
 tion. In order to settle this much mooted question, 
 not by an d priori off-hand method, but by syste- 
 matically consulting the old Buddhist authorities, 
 the Professors F. Max Miiller and Childers have 
 collected and compared great numbers of passages 
 in which the word Mrvana occurs, and the result is 
 that " there is not one passage which would require 
 that its meaning should be annihilation," while 
 " most, if not all," would thereby " become perfectly 
 unintelligible." 
 
 The proposition has been made that there are sev- 
 eral kinds of Mrvana, but Professor Childers re- 
 gards this theory as a complete failure ; he says : 
 
 ** An extraordinary error, originating, I think, with Bur- 
 nouf , and repeated unsuspectingly by several eminent Euro- 
 pean scholars, has done much to involve the question of Nir- 
 vana in needless doubt and obscurity. It is the belief that 
 there are three degrees of Nirvana, viz., Nibbana, Parinibba- 
 na, and Mahaparinibbana (ordinary Nirvana, complete Nir- 
 vana, and the great complete Nirvana). This idea is strangely 
 wide of the truth, for Parinibbana means merely Nirvana, or 
 the attainment of Nirvana, and Mahaparinibbana means noth- 
 ing more than the death of Buddha." 
 
 Professor Khys Davids sums up his disscussion of 
 the meaning of Nirvana in the following words : 
 
 "It is the extinction of that sinful, grasping condition of 
 mind and heart, which would otherwise, according to the 
 great mystery of Karma, be the cause of renewed individual 
 existence. That extinction is to be brought about by, and runs 
 parallel with, the growth of the opposite condition of mind 
 
148 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 and heart ; and it is complete when that opposite condition is 
 reached. Nirvana is therefore the same thing as a sinless, calm 
 state of mind ; and if translated at all, may best, perhaps, be 
 rendered " holiness, — holiness that is, in the Buddhist sense 
 perfect peace, goodness, and wisdom." 
 
 Professor Childers presents us with a careful ex- 
 position of the problem in his " Pali Dictionary," 
 suh voce Nibbana, the Pali word for !N^irvana. He 
 says: 
 
 " The difficulty is this : It is true that many expressions 
 are used of Nirvdna which seem to imply annihilation, but 
 on the other hand, other equally numerous and equally forci- 
 ble expressions are used which clearly point to blissful exist- 
 ence. Thus Nirvana is called Freedom from Human Passion, 
 Purity, Holiness, Bliss, Happiness, the End of Suffering, the 
 Cessation of desire, Peace, Calm, Tranquillity, and so on. 
 How is this discrepancy to be reconciled ? I reply, the word 
 nibbdna is applied to two different things, first that annihila- 
 tion of being which is the goal of Buddhism, and secondly, 
 the state of blissful sanctification called arahatta. or Arhat- 
 ship, which terminates in annihilation. This fact at once ex- 
 plains the apparent contradiction. 
 
 "At first sight it may appear inexplicable that the same 
 term should be applied to two things so different as annihila- 
 tion and blissful existence ; but I think I am able to show 
 that after all the phenomenon may be easily accounted for 
 . . . . Thus, if we say *Nirv&na is the reward of a vir- 
 tuous life,' this may, strictly speaking mean that annihilation 
 is the reward of a virtuous life ; but since annihilation can- 
 not be obtained without Arhatship, the idea that Arhatship is 
 the reward of a virtuous life, inevitably presents itself to the 
 mind at the same time. 
 
 " Although expressions like * extinction is bliss ' may soimd 
 strange or even ridiculous to us, who have from our earliest 
 infancy been taught that bliss consists in eternal life, to a 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 149 
 
 Buddhist, who has always been taught that existence Is an 
 evil they appear perfectly natural and familiar ; this is a mere 
 question of education and association ; the words ' extinction 
 is bliss ' convey to the mind of a Buddhist the same feeling of 
 enthusiastic longing, the same consciousness of sublime truth, 
 that the words * eternal life is bliss' convey to a Christian." 
 
 Thus we have according to Professor Childers the 
 bliss of Arhatship and the complete extinction of 
 being, one as the cause of the other. The Arhat, on 
 reaching the goal of Nirvana, ceases to exist as an 
 individual person. He says : 
 
 "The doctrine of Buddha on this subject is perfectly ex- 
 plicit ; he even predicted his own death. Now, to be the ulti- 
 mate goal of Buddhism, Arhatship must be an eternal state, 
 for if it be not eternal, it must sooner or later terminate, 
 either in annihilation, or in a state which is not blissful, in 
 either case it is not the goal of Buddhism. But since Arhats 
 die, Arhatship is not an eternal state and therefore it is not the 
 goal of Buddhism. It is almost superfluous to add that not 
 only is there no trace in the Buddhist scriptures of the 
 Arhats continuing to exist after death, but it is deliberately 
 stated in innumerable passages, with all the clearness and 
 emphasis of which language is capable, that the Arhat does 
 not live again after death, but ceases to exist. There is 
 probably no doctrine more distinctive of ^akyamuni's orig- 
 inal teaching than that of the annihilation of being." 
 
 This solution appears to be nihilistic ; but it seems 
 to me that the complete annihilation of Gautama 
 Siddhartha does not imply the complete annihilation 
 of Buddha. Buddha is said to have entered Nirvana 
 when he died. Yet at the same time we are told 
 that Buddha had attained Mrvana already during 
 his life. Indeed, enlightenment and Nirvana are, 
 
150 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 among all Buddhists of the Hinayana as well as the 
 Mahayana exact synonyms. Nirvana, the extinction 
 of the illusion of self, is the condition of enlighten- 
 ment, or perfect understanding of truth. A Buddha 
 is an ideal construction of a man in whom all error 
 and the consequences of error, desires, and sin, have 
 been abrogated ; his will is purified, his thoughts are 
 undimmed by illusions, and his mind consists of a 
 perfect knowledge of truth. 
 
 There is among orthodox Buddhists no doubt at 
 all that when a Buddha dies his physical existence 
 is dissolved into its elements ; and this dissolution is 
 regarded as a final deliverance of that part of man's 
 nature which is the cause of pain and suffering ; but 
 the truth, being that element Avhich constitutes his 
 Buddhahood, remains. The life in the flesh is ended, 
 but the life in Nirvana continues. Now, as Buddha- 
 hood is considered the aim of all evolution of life, 
 while the by-paths of sin and error, which consist in 
 circles of useless migrations, lead us away from our 
 goal, Buddha is praised for having escaped the pain- 
 ful repetition of the course of migrations. A 
 Buddha has reached the goal and has attained eter- 
 nity. He is reborn into the world of error, only to 
 appear as a teacher to point out to others the escape 
 from illusion, sin, and death. 
 
 According to the orthodox Buddhist conception 
 there is no doubt about it that the incarnation of 
 Buddha in the person of Gautama Siddhartha has 
 passed away. Gautama has died and his body will 
 not be resurrected. But Buddha continues to live 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 151 
 
 in the body of the Dharma, i. e., the law or religion 
 of Buddha ; and, in so far as he is the truth, he is 
 immortal and eternal. The whole world may break 
 to pieces, but Buddha will not die. The words of 
 Buddha are imperishable. We read in the " Budd- 
 hist Birth Stories " the following remarkable passage 
 which strongly reminds us of Matthew xxiv. 35.* 
 One of the Bodhisattvas, taking the resolution of 
 becoming a Buddha, says : 
 
 "The Buddhas speak not doubtful words, the Conquerors 
 
 speak not vain words, 
 There is no falsehood in the Buddhas,— verily I shall become 
 
 a Buddha. 
 As a clod cast into the air doth surely fall to the ground, 
 So the word of the glorious Buddhas is sure and everlasting. 
 As the death of all mortals is sure and constant, 
 So the word of the glorious Buddhas is sure and everlasting, 
 As the rising of the sun is certain when night has faded. 
 So the word of the glorious Buddhas is sure and everlasting. 
 As the roaring of a lion who has left his den is certain. 
 So the word of the glorious Buddhas is sure and everlasting. 
 As the delivery of women with child is certain, 
 So the word of the glorious Buddhas is sure and everlasting." 
 
 Christ, when taking leave of his disciples, comforts 
 them, saying, " Lo I am with you alway even unto 
 the end of the world," and Buddha expresses the 
 same idea when in the hour of his death the Mallas 
 are anxious to behold the Blessed One. Buddha 
 
 " Seeking the way, you must exert yourselves and strive 
 * Cf. also Mark xiii. 31 ; Luke xvi. 17 ; Luke xxi. 33. 
 
152 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 with diligence — it is not enough to have seen me ! Walk, as I 
 have commanded you ; get rid of all the tangled net of sorrow ; 
 
 " Walk in the way with steadfast aim. ... A sick man 
 depending on the healing power of medicine, 
 
 " Gets rid of all liis ailments easily without beholding the 
 physician. He who does not do what I command sees me in 
 vain, this brings no profit ; 
 
 "Whilst he who lives far off from where I am, and yet 
 walks righteously, is ever near me ! A man may dwell beside 
 me, and yet, being disobedient, be far away from me." 
 (Sacred Books of the East, XIX. pp. 289-290.) 
 
 He who knows the truth and leads a life of truth, 
 walking in the eightfold path of righteousness, has 
 attained to Nirvana and is with Buddha. And this 
 view can only be called nihilism if Truth is an un- 
 meaning word, and if moral aspirations are destruc- 
 tive of life. 
 
 There are many synonyms and explanatory epithets 
 of Nirvana. For an enumeration of Pali synonyms 
 of Nirvana see Childers's Dictionary of the Pali 
 Language, pp. 272, 274, among which are such expres- 
 sions as the Imperishable, the Infinite, the Eternal, 
 the Everlasting, the Supreme, the Transcendent, the 
 Serene, the Formless, the Yoid, Cessation, the Uncon- 
 ditioned, the Goal, the Other Shore, Rest, the True 
 or the Truth. Nirvana is compared to " an island 
 which no flood can overwhelm," to a " city of peace," 
 the " jewelled realm of happiness," " an escape from 
 the dominion of Mara," the tempter, or the evil 
 one ; and the disciple of Buddha, we are told, will 
 overcome " the world of men, the world of Yama,* 
 
 ♦ The god of Death. 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 153 
 
 and the world of gods." The Siamese always refer 
 to it as in the phrases " Nirvana is a place of comfort 
 where there is no care ; lovely is the glorious realm 
 of Nirvana." In Chapter XXYI. of the Dhamma- 
 pada we read : 
 
 *' When you have understood the destruction of all that 
 was made, you will understand that which was not made." 
 
 The most negative expression of all the synonyms 
 of Nirvana is the term " Yoid," and its mere exist- 
 ence in Buddhist books appears to favor the nihil- 
 istic conception of Buddhism. But what, in that 
 case, shall we make of such sayings as "the 
 voidness alone is self-existent and perfect " ? The 
 " abstract " may be a more appropriate translation 
 than " the void," at least it would be less objec- 
 tionable to those who have devoted themselves to 
 the study of the philosophers of abstract thought. 
 
 It is sometimes difficult to understand the reason 
 why an idea such as hollowness or emptiness or 
 voidness, which to us denotes the absence of exist- 
 ence, has become pregnant with meaning in other 
 languages ; and we must be careful not to impute 
 the negativism of our speech to the thought of 
 others. Thus we find, on an old palm-leaf manuscript 
 written in Sanskrit and preserved since 609 A. D. 
 in the Buddhist monastery of Horiuzi, Japan, 
 " emptiness " identified with " form " ; * and that 
 
 * See page 48 in Tlie Ancient Palmleaves, edited by F. Max 
 Miiller and Bunyin Nanjio. Appendix by G. Biihler. (Oxford, 
 1884.) 
 
154 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 most remarkable philosopher of China, Lau-toze, 
 gives us the key to the probable solution of the 
 problem when he says in " Tau-Teh-King," XI. : 
 
 *' The thirty spokes unite in the one nave ; but it is on the 
 empty space (for the axle) that the use of the wheel depends. 
 Clay is fashioned into vessels ; but it is on their empty hol- 
 lowness that their use depends. The door and windows are 
 cut out (from the walls) to form an apartment ; but it is on 
 the empty space (within), that its use depends. Therefore, 
 what has a (positive) existence serves for profitable adapta- 
 tion, and what has not that for (actual) usefulness. 
 
 Buddha himself abstained from making any pos- 
 itive statements as to the nature of Nirvana. 
 Whether we call it by positive or negative names 
 is a matter of indifference and does not conduce 
 to holiness. In this sense Buddha answers the ques- 
 tion of Malukya: "Does the Tathagata live on 
 beyond death or does he not live on beyond death ? " 
 Buddha says : 
 
 '* If a man were struck by a poisoned arrow, and his friends 
 and relatives called in a skilful physician, what if the wounded 
 man said, ' I shall not allow my wound treated until I know 
 who the man is by whom I have been wounded, whether he is 
 a noble, a Brahman, a Vaigya, or ^udra,' — or ifhesaid, *I 
 shall not allow my wound to be treated until I know what 
 they call the man who has wounded me, and of what family 
 he is, whether he is tall, or small, or of middle stature, and 
 how his weapon was made with which he has struck me.' " 
 
 This much is certain, that Buddha, while speaking 
 of the bliss of Nirvana, denied the continued exist- 
 ence of man's individualized body. Arhatship was 
 eternal to him, but the Arhat's body dies. 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 155 
 
 Surrounded by these difficulties and contradictory 
 opinions, let us bear in mind how close the resem- 
 blance is between the Buddhist idea of Nirvana and 
 the Christian hope of Heaven. It has often been 
 remarked that many passages of the sacred writings 
 of Buddhism would remain perfectly intelligible if 
 we replace the word Nirvana by Heaven. This 
 would, in one respect, be very misleading ; Christians 
 cling to the idea that in heaven the personality of 
 the soul is preserved as a separate and discrete 
 entity. The Christian hope of resurrection longs 
 for a preservation of the ego, not of the mind. And 
 on this point Buddhism is very unequivocal. Bud- 
 dha denies the existence of any soul-substratum, or 
 ego-entity ; he rejects the old Brahmanical doctrine 
 of the atman, or self, which is said to be the meta- 
 physical subject of man's sensations, thoughts, and 
 volitions. But while there is an obvious difference 
 between Nirvana and Heaven, there is also a close 
 resemblance not only of allegorical expressions and 
 descriptions of the mystics, but also in the attempt 
 at defining its nature in exact terms. There are 
 some remarkable passages in the New Testament, 
 one of which indicates not less clearly that the final 
 aim of Christ's mission is the obliteration of person- 
 ality by saying, " that God will be all in all," (1 
 Cor. XV. 28) and this final aim is characterized in 
 the words: "There remaineth therefore a rest for 
 the people of God " (Hebr. iv. 9). Comparing this 
 rest to a great Sabbath the Apostle says : " He that 
 is entered into his rest, he also has ceased from liis 
 
156 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 own works as God did from his. Let us labor there- 
 fore to enter into that rest." And Jesus himself 
 says, " Take my yoke upon you . . . and ye shall find 
 rest unto your souls." In the face of these passages 
 we can scarcely say that Christianity regards Heaven 
 as a locality, and when we try to define positively 
 what the orthodox Christian position is, or ought 
 to be, we shall find ourselves implicated in no less 
 intricate historico-philological problems than our 
 Pali scholars are in their investigations of Kir van a. 
 When Christian missionaries discovered some Chris- 
 tian color-prints of Jesus and biblical stories in 
 Thibet, the Lama (as we read in Schlagintweit's 
 " Buddhism in Thibet," p. 99) presented to them his 
 view of the Christian salvation, as follows : 
 
 *' Christianity does not afford final emancipation. Accord- 
 ing to the principles of their religion, he said, the pious are 
 rewarded with a re-birth amongst the servants of the supreme 
 God, when they are obliged to pass an eternity in reciting 
 hymns, psalms, and prayers in his glory. Such beings, he 
 argued, are consequently not yet freed from metempsychosis, 
 for who can assert that in the event of their relaxing in the 
 duty assigned them, they shall not be expelled from the world 
 where God resides and in punishment be re-born in the habita- 
 tion of the wretched." 
 
 Schlagintweit adds : 
 
 "He must have heard of the expulsion of the bad angels 
 from Heaven." 
 
 The Lamaistic misconception of the Christian 
 Heaven seems to be analogous to the Christian mis 
 conception of the Buddhist Nirvana. One is quite 
 as excusable as the other. 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 157 
 
 Schlagintweit says, that " genuine Buddhism re- 
 jects the idea of a particular locality being appro- 
 priated to Mrvana," and IS'agasena says to King 
 Milinda, " Mr van a is wherever the precepts can be 
 observed ... it may be anywhere." When these 
 passages are compared with the doctrine of Jesus, 
 who says : " The kingdom of God is within you," 
 we should not be astonished to find some mystic 
 Lamas of Thibet declare that since the Christian 
 doctrine of Heaven, according to Christ's own teach- 
 iug, is purely internal and does not imply the positive 
 existence of a domain somewhere in space, it implies 
 an utter and desolate nihilism. 
 
 Schlagintweit ^ says : " The sacred Buddhist books 
 declare at every occasion that it is impossible pos- 
 itively to define the attributes and properties of 
 I^irvana." A Thibetan Buddhist scholar might say 
 the same thing to his countrymen in explanation of 
 the Christian conception of Heaven. 
 
 If we were to hunt for Christian expressions of 
 Heaven which are similar to the Buddhist similes of 
 Mrvana, we could find plenty of them, especially in 
 the sermons of the mystics. Those who are inclined 
 to philosophical speculation present the closest ap- 
 proach to a so-called negative formulation : Heaven, 
 not otherwise than N'irvana, is praised as an utter 
 extermination of self ; self disappears in the omni- 
 presence of God, and reappears only as the trans- 
 figured standard-bearer of the cause of righteousness. 
 
 Whether or not this view is to be regarded a^ 
 * L. c, p. 99, 
 
158 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 nihilism should be judged from the course of ethics 
 which is derived from it. If Buddhistic ethics are 
 correctly characterized as quietism, we can justly 
 classify its doctrines as nihilism. Noav we find that 
 the same objections made by Western people must 
 have been made in Buddha's time by men trained in 
 the schools of Brahmanism ; there is a passage in the 
 Mahavagga in which Buddha very plainly expounds 
 his view of action and non-action. He admits that 
 he teaches a certain kind of quietism, but he 
 vigorously rejects the quietism of indolence and in- 
 activity. We read in YI., 31, 4 : 
 
 *' Siha, the general, said to the Blessed One : ' I have heard, 
 Lord, that the Samana Gotama denies the result of actions ; 
 he teaches the doctrine of non-action, and in this doctrine he 
 trains his disciples. Now, Lord, those who speak thus, . . . 
 do they say the truth or do they bear false witness against 
 the Blessed One, and pass off a spurious Dhainma as your 
 Dhamma ? ' " 
 
 The answer given by Buddha is as follows : 
 
 " There is a way, Siha, in which one speaking truly could 
 say of me : ' The Samana Gotama denies action ; he teaches 
 the doctrine of non-action ; and in this doctrine he trains his 
 disciples.' 
 
 **And again, Siha, there is a way in which one speaking 
 truly could say of me : ' The Samana Gotama maintains action ; 
 he teaches the doctrine of action ; and in this doctrine he 
 trains his disciples.' 
 
 "And in which way is it, Siha, that one speaking could truly 
 say of me : ' The Samana Gotama denies action ; he teaches 
 the doctrine of non-action ; and in this doctrine he trains his 
 disciples ? ' I teach, Siha, the not-doing of such actions as are 
 unrighteous, either by deed, or by word, or by thought ; I 
 teach the not bringing about of the manifold conditions (of 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 159 
 
 heart) which are evil and not good. In this way, Siha, one 
 speaking truly could say of me : ' The Sama?ia Gotama, etc' 
 
 •'And in which way is it, Siha, that one speaking truly 
 could say of me ; ' The Samana Gotama maintains action ; he 
 teaches the doctrine of action ; and in this doctrine he trains 
 his disciples ? ' I teach, Siha, the doing of such actions as are 
 righteous, by deed, by word, and by thought : I teach the 
 bringing about of the manifold conditions (of heart) which 
 are good and not evil. In this way, etc." 
 
 In the same strain Buddha explains his doctrine 
 of annihilation and conteraptibleness, not as an ab- 
 solute annihilation, but as an annihilation of sin and 
 man's hankering after sin. He says : 
 
 •* I proclaim, Siha, the annihilation of lust, of ill-will, of 
 delusion. , . . 
 
 " I deem, Siha, unrighteous actions contemptible. . . . 
 
 **He who has freed himself, Siha, from all conditions (of 
 heart) which are evil and not good, which ought to be burned 
 away, who has rooted them out, and has done away with 
 them as a palm tree is rooted out, so that they are destroyed 
 and cannot grow up again — such a person do I call accom- 
 plished in Tapas." * (Sacred Books of the East, Vol. XVII, 
 pp. 110, 114.) 
 
 Far from preaching quietism, Buddha's sermons, 
 parables, and sentences abound in exhortations to 
 indefatigable and energetic activity. We read in 
 the Dhammapada : 
 
 •' He who does not rouse himself when it is time to rise, who 
 though young and strong is full of sloth, whose will and 
 
 *The literal meaning of Tapas is "burning"; it means self- 
 mortification. Buddha rejects self-mortification and substi- 
 tutes for it the eradication of all sinful desire, 
 
160 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 thought are weak, that lazy and idle man will never find the 
 way to knowledge [enlightenment] . 
 
 *' If anything is to be done, let a man do it, let him attack 
 it vigorously."* 
 
 The difficulty to a western mind in the compre- 
 hension of the term Mrvana lies mainly in our habit 
 of conceiving the nature of the soul in the old Brah- 
 manical sense of an ego-entity as the doer of our 
 acts, the perceiver of our sensations, and the thinker 
 of our thoughts. In ninety-nine cases out of a hun- 
 dred, he who denies the existence of that metaphy- 
 sical being is understood by people educated in our 
 present modes of thought as denying the existence 
 of our soul itself. 
 
 Buddha taught the non-existence of the self, and 
 understood by self the atman of the philosophers of 
 his time. Again and again he inculcates the em- 
 phatic injunction that the illusion of self must be 
 overcome. The illusion of self is the secret cause of 
 all selfishness; it begets all those evil desires (covet- 
 ousness,/ greed of power, and lust) of w^hich man 
 must free himself. As soon as the illusion of self is 
 overcome, Ave cease to think of injuring others for 
 the benefit of ourselves. 
 
 The Buddhist conception of Nirvana is most 
 assuredly not the annihilation of thought, but its 
 completion and perfection. We read in the Dham- 
 mapada, verse 21 : 
 
 ** Earnestness is the path of immortality (Nirvana), thought- 
 
 *Jbid., pp. 68 and 75, 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 161 
 
 lessuess the path of death. Those who are in earnest do not 
 die ; those who are thoughtless are as if dead already." 
 
 This does not savor of nihilism. 
 
 That [Nirvana is the domain of the ideal, the realm 
 of pure forms, appears very clearly from the Nirmana 
 Sutra and other Chinese sources, in which Nirvana 
 is defined as " the permanent state of being," which 
 is attained by letting go the conditions of imper- 
 manence, viz., materiality and egoity or rupa and 
 atman. Nirvana is the attainment of the state 
 where there is neither birth nor death, and is illus- 
 trated by the simile of the " guest " and the " dust," 
 as contrasted to the " rest " of pure space. Man is 
 a guest in this world and is in a condition of con- 
 stant commotion as are the dust particles hovering 
 in a sunbeam. Nirvana, however, is comparable to 
 the immutability of pure space which, while every- 
 thing is changing, remains at rest.* 
 
 Nirvana is commonly described in negative terms, 
 but it is positive which is explained in a conversa- 
 tion between an unbeliever and Buddha, related in 
 the Parinirvana Sutra (Chap, xxxix. 1) as follows : 
 
 " There was a Brahmatchari called Basita, who resumed 
 the conversation thus : ' Gotama ! Is that which you call Nir- 
 vana a permanent state of being or not ? ' ' Nirvana consists in 
 the absence [non-existence] of sorrow. Yes, Brahmatchari, it 
 may be so defined.' Basita said : ' Gotama, there are four kinds 
 of condition in the world which are spoken of as non-existent : 
 the first, that which is not as yet in being, like the pitcher to 
 
 *A Catena of Buddhist Scriptures, from the Chinese. By 
 Samuel Beal, pp. 99 and 157. 
 
 XI 
 
162 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 be made out of the clay ; secondly, that which having existed, 
 has been destroyed, as a broken pitcher ; third, that which 
 consists in the absence of something different from itself, as 
 we say the ox is not a horse ; and, lastly, that which is purely 
 imaginary as the hair of the tortoise, or the horn of the hare. 
 If, then, by having got rid of sorrow we have arrived at 
 Nirvana, Nirvana is the same as ' nothingness,' and may be 
 considered as non-existent ; but, if so, how can you define it 
 as permanence, joy, personality, and purity. 
 
 " Buddha said : ' Illustrious disciple, Nirvana is one of this 
 sort, it is not like the pitcher not yet made out of the clay, nor 
 is it like the nothingness of the pitcher which has been 
 broken ; nor is it like the horn of the hare, nor the hair of 
 the tortoise, something purely imaginary. But it may be 
 compared to the nothingness defined as the absence of some- 
 thing different from itself. Illustrious disciple, as you say, 
 although the ox has no quality of the horse in it, you cannot 
 say that the ox does not exist; and though the horse has 
 no quality of the ox in it, you cannot say that the horse 
 does not exist. Nirvana is just so. In the midst of sorrow 
 there is no Nirvana, and in Nirvana there is no sorrow. So 
 we may justly define Nirvana as that sort of non-existence 
 which consists in the absence of something essentially dif- 
 ferent." 
 
 Buddhism is commonly classified as pessimism. 
 This is true in so far as the Buddhist recognizes the 
 existence of suffering, but it is not true if by pessim- 
 ism is to be understood that world-pain which gives 
 up life and the duties of life in despair. Says Olden- 
 berg, speaking of the Buddhist canon : 
 
 " Some writers have often represented the tone prevailing 
 in it, as if it were peculiarly characterized by a feeling of 
 melancholy which bewails in endless grief the unreality of 
 being. In this they have altogether misunderstood Buddhism. 
 The true Buddhist certainly sees in this world a state of con- 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 163 
 
 tinuous sorrow, but this sorrow only awakes in him a feeling 
 of compassion for those who are yet in the world ; for him- 
 self he feels no sorrow nor compassion, for he knows he is 
 near his goal which stands awaiting him, noble beyond all 
 else." 
 
 The good tidings of Buddha's religion are not so 
 much the recognition of the existence of pain and 
 care as the conquest of evil and the escape from suf- 
 fering. The following verses from the Dhammapada 
 have no pessimistic ring : 
 
 "Let us live happily then, not hating those who hate us I 
 Among men who hate us, let us dwell free from hatred ! 
 
 "Let us live happily then, free from ailments among the 
 ailing ! Among men who are ailing, let us dwell free from 
 ailments ! 
 
 " Let us live happily then, free from greed among the greedy I 
 Among men who are greedy, let us dwell free from greed I " 
 
 The Buddhist Mrvana, accordingly, can only be 
 conceived as a negative condition by those who are 
 still entangled in the illusion of self. Kirvana is not 
 death but eternal life, not annihilation but immor- 
 tality, not destruction but Indestructibility. "Were 
 truth and morality negative, Nirvana would be neg- 
 ative also ; as they are positive, Nirvana is positive. 
 The soul of every man continues in what Buddhists 
 call his Karma, and he who attains Buddhahood 
 becomes thereby identical with truth itself, which is 
 everlasting and omnipresent, pervading not only this 
 world system, but all other worlds that are to be in 
 the future. For truth is the same to-day as it will 
 be to-morrow. Truth is the water of life, it is the 
 
164 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 ambrosia of the soul. The more our mind rids itself 
 of selfishness and partakes of the truth, the higher 
 shall we rise intS that domain where all tribulations 
 and anxieties have disappeared, for there sin is 
 blotted out and death conquered. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 pHKISTIANITY, including Roman and Greek 
 ^ Catholics, the Protestants and all the smaller 
 sects, may lay claim to about twenty-six per cent, 
 of the inhabitants of the earth, and ranks, in number 
 of adherents, as the second greatest religion. It is 
 considerably surpassed by Buddhism, Avhich is calcu- 
 lated by Prof. Rhys Davids to count five hundred 
 million adherents, or forty per cent, of all the inhab- 
 itants of the earth.* The next religions f in order are 
 Hinduism with thirteen, and Islam with twelve and 
 
 * The objection has been made by Sir Monier M. Williams 
 that the Chinese Buddhists are at the same time Confucionists 
 and Taoists, therefore he claims that if the number of Bud- 
 dhists were reduced to those who are true Buddhists, and noth- 
 ing but Buddhists, Christianity could easily be proved to be 
 numerically the first religion of the world. This may be true, 
 but is this method of using statistics legitimate ? Would it 
 not in that case be fair to apply the same restriction to both 
 sides? The number of Christians would shrink in no less de- 
 gree if we counted the real Christians, or at least the confessed 
 Christians only, which in the United States would reduce them 
 to the churched people who are less than one-tenth of the 
 entire population. 
 
 t For details see the statistical tables on pp. 4-5 of Rhys 
 Davids's Buddhism published in the series of Non-Christian 
 Religious Systems, London, 1890. 
 
 165 
 
t 
 
 166 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 one half per cent. In addition we have one half 
 per cent. Jews, and eight per cent, of other creeds 
 of less importance. 
 p" Now it is a strange fact that Buddhism and Chris- 
 tianity, constituting together sixty-six per cent., 
 which is considerably more than one half of man- 
 kind, possess several most important features in 
 common, and their agreement cannot be a product 
 of mere chance. It is well known that many Chris- 
 tian missionaries * were quite at a loss to account 
 for so many striking coincidences. Bishop Bigandet, 
 the Apostolic Yicar of Ava and Pegu, writes : 
 
 *' Most of the moral truths, prescribed by the Gospel, are to 
 be met with in the Buddhistic scriptures. ... In reading the 
 particulars of the life of the last Buddha, Gaudama, it is im- 
 possible not to feel reminded of many circumstances relating 
 to our Saviour's life, such as it has been sketched out by the 
 Evangelists." 
 
 The Kev. Hampden C. Du Bose, a Protestant mis- 
 sionary, says about Romanism and Buddhism : f 
 
 *' The traveller who notes the similarity between those two 
 great systems of faith and worship must on comparison con- 
 clude that Romanism is Buddhism prepared for a foreign 
 market, — Buddhism adapted to a Western civilization. The 
 question troubled the earlier Catholic missionaries, and ' Pre- 
 mare ascribed these ceremonies to the Devil, who had thus 
 imitated holy mother Church, in order to scandalize and 
 oppose its rights.' *To those who admit that most of the 
 Romish ceremonies are borrowed from Paganism, there is less 
 difficulty in accounting for the resemblance.' " 
 
 * Quoted in 3 Tie Monist, Vol. IV, No. 3, p. 418. 
 t The Dragon, Image, and Demon, p. 290. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 167 
 
 And the Jesuit missionaries, Hue and Gabet, ex- 
 press their views of the subject as follows : * 
 
 ** Upon the most superficial examination of the reforms and 
 innovations introduced by Tsong-Kaba into the Lamanesque 
 worship, one must be struck with their affinity to Catholicism. 
 The cross, the mitre, the dalmatida, the cope, which the Grand 
 Lamas wear on their journeys, or when they are performing 
 some ceremony out of the temple ; the service with double 
 choirs, the psalmody, the exorcisms, the censer suspended 
 from five chains, and which you can open or close at pleasure ; 
 the benedictions given by the Lamas by extending the right 
 hand over the heads of the faithful ; the chaplet, ecclesiastical 
 celibacy, spiritual retirement, the worship of the saints, the 
 fasts, the processions, the litanies, the holy water, all these 
 are analogies between the Buddhists and ourselves. Now, 
 can it be said that these analogies are of Christian origin? 
 We think so. We have indeed found, neither in the traditions 
 nor in the monuments of the country, any positive proof of 
 their adoption, still it is perfectly legitimate to put forward 
 conjectures which possess all the characteristics of the most 
 emphatic probability. 
 
 There are some other less striking, but by no 
 means less remarkable similarities that obtain be- 
 tween the cults of Buddhism and Christianity, and 
 it would take volumes to explain them all. We 
 mention only one more instance which is the " tee " 
 in Buddhist pagodas, which is represented by a 
 canopy over Koman Catholic altars. The Buddhist 
 tee is originally an umbrella, viz., "the umbrella 
 of sovereignty" which when executed in stone 
 assumed a square form. There are many tees in 
 existence which are over 2,000 years old. The old- 
 
 * Travels in Tartary, Thibet, and China, Eng. 2d Ed., p. 50. 
 
168 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 est tee that still preserves the exact shape of an 
 umbrella is still found in the caves of Ajanta. 
 The canopy in the Koman Catholic ritual is ex- 
 plained as the divine Presence that overshadows 
 the altar. 
 
 The Jesuit missionaries believe that the Buddhists 
 adopted their rituals from Eoman Catholic mission- 
 aries. They say : 
 
 ** It is known that, in the fourteenth century, at the time 
 of the domination of the Mongol emperors, there existed fre- 
 quent relations between the Europeans and the peoples of 
 Upper Asia. We have already, in the former part of our 
 narrative, referred to these celebrated embassies which the 
 Tartar conquerors sent to Rome, to France, and to England. 
 There is no doubt that the barbarians who thus visited Europe 
 must have been struck with the pomp and splendor of the 
 ceremonies of Catholic worship, and must have carried back 
 with them into the desert enduring memories of what they 
 had seen. On the other hand, it is also known that, at the 
 same period, brethren of various religious orders undertook 
 remote pilgrimages for the purpose of introducing Christianity 
 into Tartary ; and these must have penetrated at the same 
 time into Tliibet, among the Si-Fan, and among the Mongols 
 on the Blue Sea. Jean de Montcorvin, Archbishop of Peking, 
 had already organized a choir of Mongol monks, who daily 
 practised the recitation of the psalms and the ceremonies of 
 the Catholic faith. Now, if one reflects that Tsong-Kaba 
 lived precisely at the period when the Christian religion was 
 being introduced into Central Asia, it will be no longer matter 
 of astonishment that we find, in reformed Buddhism, such 
 striking analogies with Christianity." 
 
 How improbable is this theory! l^ay, it is im- 
 possible in the face of the fact that the Lamaistic 
 ritual dates back to the time of Fa-Hien. Although 
 
THE BASIC CONCEPTS OF BUDDHISM. 169 
 
 it is quite probable that Nestorian rituals, which is 
 the shape in which Christianity reached Thibet in the 
 seventh century, may have modified the Buddhist 
 rituals considerably, we cannot deny that many of 
 the most salient features of Thibetan Lamaism, such 
 as the usage of rosaries, incense burning, the chanting 
 of psalmodies, tonsures, etc., are unquestionably older 
 than Christianity itself. Various church institutions, 
 such as monkhood, processions, relic worship, etc., 
 are not founded on the J^ew Testament, and their 
 origin in Christianity cannot be explained from the 
 life history of Christ. The coincidences between 
 Buddhism and Christianity are the more puzzling 
 as they include so many trivial externalities. 
 
 The idea of a Buddhistic origin of Christianity 
 has been suggested more than once ; but it is incum- 
 bent upon us to state that some of the men who 
 must be regarded as the most competent to judge 
 this matter are either extremely reticent or scorn 
 the suggestion as quite impossible. While it is true 
 that Arthur Lillie and Rudolf Seydel, who have 
 done most to make the theory popular, introduce 
 many vague speculations, we cannot regard a refuta- 
 tion of some of their vagaries as sufficient to settle 
 the question. No argument has as yet been offered 
 to dispose of the hypothesis, which possesses, to say 
 the least, a great probability in its favor. It is our 
 intention here to enumerate some of the most salient 
 facts so as to show them in their full importance, in 
 the hope that specialists will give us more light on 
 the subject. We repeat the motto which Albrecht 
 
170 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 "Weber inscribed upon the title page of his Indische 
 Literaturgeschichte : 
 
 "Nil desperari! 
 
 Auoh hier wird es tagen." 
 
 f The agreement of the ethical spirit of both relig- 
 ions, Buddhism and Christianity, appears the more 
 striking from our being confronted with an obvious 
 difference between their dogmatologies. Christians 
 believe in God, soul, and immortality, while Bud- 
 dhists aspire to reach Nirvana. They have no such 
 terms as God and soul. On the contrary, they re- 
 ject the ideas of a personal Creator of the world 
 and of an indissoluble soul-unit, an atman, or ego- 
 entity in man, and thus they are decried by Chris- 
 tians as atheists and deniers of the existence of the 
 soul. Having explained in a previous article that 
 Buddhism is not negative, that its Nirvana is neither 
 more nor less positive than the Christian heaven, 
 and that Buddha only rejects the gratuitous assump- 
 tion of a metaphysical soul -agent behind the soul, 
 [not the existence of the soul Itself, we shall now 
 Preview the most obvdous similarities and dissimilar- 
 ities of Buddhism and Christianity ; and we come to 
 the conclusion that, supposing no historical connec- 
 tion exists hetween the two faiths^ their agreement must 
 he regarded as very remarhable ; for in that case we 
 must recognize the fact that both Buddhists and 
 Christians, facing the same problems of life^ solve 
 I them in a similar spirit although using different 
 modes of expression. It would go far to prove that 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 171 
 
 the basic t^mths of both religions are deeply rooted in 
 the nature of things and cannot be supposed (as is 
 the theory of supernaturalistic dualism) to stand in 
 contradiction to the cosmic order of the world or to 
 the laws according to which social institutions 
 develop. 
 
 A^ BUDDHA AND CHRIST. 
 
 > Let us briefly recapitulate the similarities that 
 ^►A obtain between Buddhism and Christianity. 
 
 iM As St. John prepared the way for Christ, so 
 ^ Sumedha is anxious to be of assistance in clearing 
 the path for Buddha. The people tell him : * 
 
 A mighty Buddha has appeared, 
 
 A Conqueror, Lord of all the world, 
 
 Whose name is Dipamkara. 
 
 For him is being cleared the way, 
 
 The path, the track to travel on.~Verse 51. 
 
 Sumedha replied : 
 
 '*' For a Buddha do ye clear the road? 
 Then, pray, grant also me a place I 
 I, too, will help to clear the way. 
 The path, the track to travel on." 
 
 As according to Isaiah " every valley shall be ex- 
 alted and every mountain and hill shall be made 
 low " at the coming of the glory of the Lord (Isaiah, 
 xl, 3-5), so we read in the Sumangala Yilasini (Bud- 
 dhagosa's Commentary on the Digha Nikaya) that 
 
 * Introduction to the Jatakas. See H. C. Warren's Bud- 
 dhism in Translations, p. 12. 
 
172 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 where the Buddha walks, " elevations of ground de- 
 press themselves and depressions elevate themselves ; 
 wherever he places his foot, the ground is even and 
 pleasant to walk upon." — (H. C. Warren, Buddhism 
 in Translations, p. 92.) 
 
 According to the sacred legends, Buddha, like 
 Christ, was of royal, not of priestly, lineage ; and his 
 life while he was still a babe was jeopardized on 
 account of the transcendent glory of his future. 
 The chapter entitled " The Fear of Bimbisara," * 
 contains a parallel to the story of Herod's massacre 
 of the infants in Bethlehem. The state ministers of 
 Maghada make inquiry if there be any one capable 
 of depriving the king of his regal power. Two of 
 their messengers find among the Shakyas an infant 
 newly born, the first begotten of his mother, who 
 would either become a universal monarch or a Bud- 
 dha. On their return they exhort the king " to raise 
 an army and destroy the child, lest he should over- 
 turn the empire of the king." But Bimbisara (unlike 
 Herod of the New Testament) refuses to commit the 
 crime. The Christian story of the massacre of chil- 
 dren is probably derived from the older Brahraanical 
 legend of Krishna, who is persecuted as an infant 
 by the tyrant of Madura. The latter, unable to 
 find the boy, ordains the massacre of all the chil- 
 dren of male sex born during the night of Krishna's 
 birth. 
 ( Both Buddha and Christ led a life of poverty. 
 Both wandered about without a home, without a 
 * Beal, Romantic History of Buddha, pp. 103-104. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY, 173 
 
 family, without property. They lived like the lilies 
 of the field, and preached to all people, to rich and / i 
 poor alike, without distinction of class, the gospel of V 
 the deliverance from evil. 
 
 Buddha is called Dharma-raja, the king of truth, 
 and Christ before Pilate repudiates the idea that his 
 kingdom is of this world. He is frequently repre- 
 sented by Christians as the King of Truth. Buddha 
 is called Shakya-simha, the lion of the Shakya, while 
 Christ is the lion of Judah. Buddha charges his I 
 disciples to carry the message of the glorious doc- 
 trine everywhere, saying " desetha, bhikkhave kal- 
 yano dhammo," i. e., " Expound, O Bhikkhus, the 
 happy truth." The word '•' Kalyano " is translated 
 in Chalmers' dictionary by " fortunate, blest, happy ; 
 beautiful, charming, pleasant ; good, virtuous," and 
 if halydno dhammo had to be rendered into Greek, 
 we would consider the term sbayyiXtov as a most ap- 
 propriate translation. There is no essential differ- 
 ence between the English '' gospel," i. e. good spell, 
 and the Pali Jcalydno dhammo , i. e., the good doc- 
 trine. ,^ 
 
 The same story which is told of Mary in the ] 
 Apocryphal gospel of the Infancy of Mary (Chap. 6) f 
 is told of Buddha in the Jataka (Warren, Buddh. in 
 Trans., p. 47). Both are reported to have walked/ J 
 soon after their birth, while still helpless babies, to y' 
 the astonishment of their parents and other specta- 
 tors. Only there is this addition, that the Buddha 
 baby also speaks and announces his greatness in the 
 -words : " The chief am I of all the world." I 
 
174 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 How strangely Christian are the injunctions so 
 frequently found in Buddhist scriptures, to have 
 faith and to make use of the time of grace. We 
 read, for instance, in the Jataka ; * 
 
 If in this present time of grace, 
 You do not reach the happy state 
 Long will you suffer deep remorse. 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ, according to the canon- 
 ical books of their respective religions were hailed 
 soon after their birth, as the saviours of the world, by 
 celestial spirits, by a religious prophet, and by sages. 
 Devas, like the angels in the Christian Gospel, sing 
 hymns. Asita is the Christian Simeon ; the JS'aga- 
 rajas are the Magi. Aged women are also mentioned, 
 who, like Anna, bless the baby.f 
 
 We read in the Tibetan Zife of BuddKa : % 
 
 " It was the habit of the Qakyas to make all new-bom child- 
 ren bow down at the feet of a statue of the yaksha Qakyavar- 
 dana ; so the king took the young child to the temple, but tlie 
 yaksha bowed down at his feet. . . . When the king saw 
 the yaksha bow at the child's feet he exclaimed, * He is the 
 god of gods ! ' and the child was therefore called Devatideva." 
 
 * Buddhist Birth Stories. Translated by T. W. Rhys Davids, 
 p. 157. 
 
 f See Ashvaghosha's Life of Buddha^ verses 39-40. — Sacred 
 Books of the East, (afterwards cited as S. B. of E.) vol. xix, 
 pp. 1-20. 
 
 X TJie Life of Buddha and the Early History of His Order, 
 Derived from Tibetan Works in theBkah-Hgyur, Bstan-Hgyur, 
 translated by W. Woodville Rockhill, p. 17. See also S. Beal, 
 Eomantic Histoi'y of Buddha, p. 52. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 175 
 
 The apocryphal Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew con- 
 tains a similar passage : * 
 
 " Now it came to pass that when the most blessed Mary, 
 with her little infant, had entered the temple, all the idols 
 were prostrate on the earth, so that they all lay upon their 
 faces wholly shattered and broken." 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ excelled their teachers. 
 Both were greeted by a woman who was delighted 
 with their personal beauty. The " noble virgin Kisa 
 Gotami " bursts forth into the song : 
 
 ** Blessed indeed is the mother. 
 Blessed indeed is the father, 
 Blessed indeed is the wife. 
 Who owns this lord so glorious." 
 
 —Birth Stories, p. 80. 
 
 This reminds one of the incident mentioned in 
 Luke xi, 27 : 
 
 *' And it came to pass, as he spake these things, a certain 
 woman of the company lifted up her voice, and said unto him, 
 Blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou 
 hast sucked." 
 
 The word Nibhuta^ i. e. " blessed, happy, peace," 
 reminds Buddha of Nihhuti^ i. e., Ni'bbana.\ He 
 says: 
 
 " By what can every heart attain to lasting happiness and 
 peace! 
 
 * The Apocryphal Gospels, tr. by B. Harris Cowper, 4th ed., 
 p. 63. See also The Arabic Gospel of the Infancy, ibid., p. 178. 
 f Birth Stories, p. 80, and Spence Hardy, Manual, p. 160. 
 
176 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 ** And to him whose mind was estranged from sin the an- 
 swer came. ' When the fire of lust is gone out then peace is 
 gained ; when the fires of hatred and delusion are gone out, 
 then peace is gained ; when the troubles of mind, arising from 
 pride, credulity, and all other sins, have ceased, then peace is 
 gained ! ' Sweet is the lesson this singer makes me hear, for 
 the Nirvana of Peace is that which I have been trying to find 
 out. This very day I will break away from household cares ! 
 I will renounce the world ! I wiU follow only after the Nirvana 
 itself I" 
 
 In a similar spirit Christ replies (Luke xi. 28) : 
 
 •'Yea, rather blessed are they that hear the word of God, 
 and keep it." 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ were tempted by the 
 Evil One.* 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ confessed their mission 
 to be the establishing on earth of a kingdom of 
 righteousness ; f they sent out their disciples to 
 ] preach the gospel. Said Buddha : 
 
 " Go ye now, O Bhikkhus, and wander, for the gain of the 
 many, for the welfare of the many, out of compassion for the 
 world, for the good, for the gain, and for the welfare of gods and 
 men. Let not two of you go the same way. Preach, O Bhikkhus, 
 the doctrine which is glorious in the beginning, glorious in the 
 
 * Compare Ashvaghosha's Life of Buddha^ chapter xiii, " De- 
 feats of Mara, S. B. of E., vol. xix, p. 147, with Luke iv. 2, 
 Matth. iv. 1-7, i. 13. 
 
 t See the Dhamma-chakka-ppai^attana-Sutta, — viz., on "The 
 Foundation of the Kingdom of Righteousness," — S. B. of E., 
 vol. xi. p. 146, and Bigandet, p. 125. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 177 
 
 middle, glorious in the end, in the spirit and in the letter ; 
 proclaim a consummate, perfect, and pure life of holiness. 
 There are beings whose mental eyes are covered by scarcely 
 any dust, but if the doctrine is not preached to them, they 
 cannot attain salvation. They will understand the doctrine. 
 And I will go also, O Bhikkhus, to Uruvela, to Senaninigama, 
 in order to preach the doctrine." * 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ refused to find recogni- ' 
 tion by pandering to the superstitions of those who 
 seek for signs; f Buddha positively forbade miracles. :[: 
 And yet to both innumerable miracles were attrib- 
 uted. 
 
 Of both we read that they walked on the water. 
 The origin of the Buddhist legend can be traced to 
 the allegorical expression of crossing the stream of 
 worldliness (samsara) and reaching the other side, 
 which is the shore of celestial rest (Xirvana). There 
 is no such spiritual meaning in Christianity, or, if 
 there was one, the metaphor has been obliterated. | 
 
 As St. Peter by the strength of his faith crossed 
 the waters of Lake Galilee, so we read in the Jataka § 
 that one of Buddha's disciples accomplished the 
 same feat. 
 
 * See Mahdvagga i, ii, p. 112, S. B. E., vol. xiii. ; compare 
 also Ashvaghosha's Life of Buddha, p. 183, with Mark iii, 14, 
 and Luke ix. 2. 
 
 f See Luke xi. 16, and passim. 
 
 X See W. W. Rockhill's lAfe of Buddha, pp. 68-69. 
 
 g The Jataka translated from the Pali by various hands 
 under the editorship of E. B. Cowell, No. 190, vol. ii, p. 77. 
 Similar stories are frequently met with in Buddhist literature. 
 See, for instance, the Chinese edition of Buddhaghosha^s Par- 
 ables, translated by Samuel Beal, Boston, 1878. 
 
 12 
 
178 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 The signs of the appearance of a Christ are the 
 same as the signs of the birth of Buddha. We read 
 in the Jataka : * 
 
 " And the Thirty-two prognostics appeared, as follows: an 
 immeasurable light spread through ten thousand worlds ; the 
 blind recovered their sight, as if from desire to see this his 
 glory ; the deaf received their hearing ; the dumb talked ; the 
 hunchbacked became straight of body ; the lame recovered 
 the power to walk ; all those in bonds were freed from their 
 bonds and chains ; the fires went out in all the hells." 
 
 How similar is Christ's reply to the disciples of 
 St. John the Baptist ! 
 
 At a marriage-feast both Buddha and Christ 
 miraculously helped the host to entertain his guests. 
 In Buddha's presence, as we are told in the story of 
 the marriage-feast at Jambunada,t a small supply of 
 food proves over and over sufficient for a great 
 number of guests. The idea of turning water into 
 wine, at the marriage at Cana,:]: is un-Buddhistic. 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ tried asceticism for a 
 time, and carried their fasts to the extreme. We 
 read: 
 
 ** Each day eating one hemp grain, his bodily form shrunken 
 and attenuated, seeking how to cross (the sea of) birth and 
 death, exercising himself still deeper and advancing further." 
 (Ashvaghosha's Life of Buddha, verse 1007.) 
 
 But both gave up these methods of gaining holi- 
 ness by self-mortification for a middle way.§ Both 
 
 * Warren, p. 44. 
 
 t Fu Pen Hing Tsi King, translated by Beal. 
 X John ii. 1, et seq. 
 
 § Dhammapada, verse 227 : Chinese version of the Dham- 
 mapada, translated by Beal, p. 122. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 179 
 
 were in consequence of it suspected by former be- 
 lievers of flagging in religious zeal. * ^ 
 Both Buddha and Christ were powerful preachers, ' 
 fond of parables, and concentrating their teachings 
 in pithy aphorisms, which were botli impressive and 
 easily remembered. Both were keen thinkers, and 
 invincible in controversies, as a rule, bringing the 
 debate to a climax by presenting a dilemma, and 
 always pressing the moral application of their the- 
 ories. Both exercised an extraordinary influence; 
 they looked into the hearts of men and swayed their 
 minds through purity of motive and the authorita- 
 tive earnestness of their personality. Both objected 
 to the traditional method of clinging to the letter of 
 religious belief which is satisfied with rituals and 
 prayers, and both substituted for it the spirit of 
 religious devotion and moral conduct.f Both loved 
 to express their sentiments in paradoxes, such as, 
 " By giving away we gain ; by losing our soul we 
 preserve it ; by non-resistance we conquer," and both 
 spoke in parables. J Many subjects of their parables 
 are the same ; as such we mention the sower § and 
 
 * Compare Ashvaghosha's Life of Bvddha, verses 1024, and 
 1222-1324, with Luke vii, 19, Matth. xi, 3. 
 
 t As an instance of Buddha's method of spiritualizing reli- 
 gious rites see the Sigdlovdda Sutta in Sept Suttas Pdlis, by 
 M. P. Grirablot (Paris), p. 311. 
 
 :}: '"Powerful in making comparisons,' is one of Buddha's 
 characteristic names."— Beal, foot-note to Ashvaghosha's Life 
 of Buddha, verse 1915, S. B. of E., xix, p. 280. 
 
 § Sutta Nipdta, p. 11-15, S. B. of E., Second Part. 
 
180 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 the lost son ; * the worldly fool who builds a large re- 
 sidence with store-rooms, but dies suddenly ;t the com- 
 parison of good deeds to seeds sown on good and bad 
 soil, according to the nature of the people, illustrating 
 the truth that in bad people the passions choke the 
 growth of merit. Buddha calls the Brahmans, and 
 Christ the Pharisees, " blind leaders of the blind." J 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ show an unexpected 
 graciousness toward a woman sinner ; § and a Budd- 
 hist disciple had an encounter with a w^oman at a 
 well analogous to that of Christ in Samaria. || 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ were,like Krishna,Ti trans- 
 figured shortly before death,** and above all, both 
 inculcated the utter extinction of desire, lust, and 
 hate in their very germ, so as to forbid all assertion 
 
 Lof self, even the resistance to evil, and both demand 
 the practice of love of enemies. ft 
 
 * Saddharmapundarika iv. 
 
 t Beal, Translation of Chinese Dhammapada, p. 77. 
 
 X Compare Matthew xv. 14, with Tevigga Sutta, i. 15, and 
 Lalita Vistara, p. 179. See also Beal's Romantic History of 
 Buddha, p. 106, where the phrase occurs, " Like a blind man 
 who undertakes to lead the blind." 
 
 § See the story of Ambapali in Mahdvagga vi. 30. The 
 courtesan Ambapali is called " Lady Amra " in the Chinese 
 version of Ashvaghosha's Life of Buddha, p. 255-256. 
 
 Il Compare John v. et seq,, with Burnouf's Introduction, 
 p. 205. 
 
 ^ The transfiguration of Krishna serves the purpose of 
 strengthening the faith of his followers in the presence of 
 danger. See JacoUiot, The Bible in India, p. 306. 
 
 ** Compare Matthew xvii. 2, and Mark ix. 2, with Mahdpari- 
 nibbdna Sutta iv. 47, 52. 
 
 ft Compare Dhammapada, 5, " Hatred ceases by love," and 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 181 
 
 SIMILARITIES IN TEACHING. 
 
 There are, in addition, numerous coincidences in 
 their utterances, so that many of the sayings of 
 Christ and Buddha appear like two different reports 
 of the same speech. Thus we read in the Sutra of 
 Forty -two Sections, 10 : 
 
 " It is difficult for the rich and noble to be religious." 
 
 And Christ said (Matthew xix. 24, Mark x. 25, and 
 Luke xviii. 25) : 
 
 " And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go 
 through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into 
 the kingdom of God." 
 
 Christ says : " Love your enemies," and we read in 
 the Dhammapada : 
 
 Hatred does not cease by hatred, hatred ceases by love only. 
 This is an old rule." 
 
 The Dharma is frequently compared to living 
 waters, as in John iv, 14, vii, 38, Rev. xxi, 6, xxii, 17, 
 and to a pearl, or a jewel, as in Matthew xiii, 45-46, 
 while Mrvana is described as a city of peace and 
 an island of jewels,* similarly as the new Jerusalem. 
 
 Yashas, the noble youth of Benares,t visits Buddha 
 in the night, like Mcodemus ; :j: but if Nicodemus 
 
 many other passages, with Matthew v. 44, "Love your 
 enemies." 
 
 * See Dhammapada, p. 181. 
 
 t Ashvaghosha's Life of Buddha^ p. 180, Mahdvagga, i. 7. 
 
 X See John iii. 2. 
 
182 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 had been a Brahman, he would not have been mys- 
 tified by Christ's proposition of the necessity of a 
 spiritual rebirth ; he would have understood the ex- 
 pression. The term " twice born " or " reborn " is 
 still among Buddhists a title of honor given to 
 priests and other men of distinction. 
 
 The coming of the Tathagata (Buddha) is likened 
 to the wind. We read in The Questions of King 
 Milinda^ P^g® 148 : 
 
 " As the great and mighty wind which blew, even so, great 
 king, has the Blessed One blown over the ten thousand world- 
 systems with the wind of his love, so cool, so sweet, so calm, 
 so delicate." 
 
 How similar, although less clear, is the passage in 
 John iii. 8 : 
 
 •' The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the 
 sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and 
 whither it goeth : so is every one that is born of the Spirit." 
 
 The Dharma (viz., religion) is said to be like the 
 salt of the ocean, " one in taste throughout, which is 
 the taste of salvation." This reminds us of Jesus say- 
 ing that his disciples are the salt of the earth ; * and 
 the exhortation is made by both Buddha and Christ 
 to lay up treasures that are incorruptible and inac- 
 cessible to thieves.f 
 
 * Questions of King Milinda, iii. 7, 15, and Chullavagga ix. 
 1, 4, which compare with Matthew v. 13. 
 
 f Compare Nidhikandasutta, the treasure chapter, where we 
 read of " A treasure that no wrong of others and no thief can 
 steal," with Matthew vi. 20. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 183 
 
 Giving is praised in preference to receiving. In 
 Ashvaghosha's Life of Buddha^ 1516-1517, we read : 
 
 '* Giving away our food, we get more strength ; giving away 
 our clothes, we get more beauty," etc. (S. B. of E., p. 315.) 
 
 In The Questions of King Milinda we find among 
 the discussions concerning apparent contradictions 
 explained by Nagasema, that " the Dharma of the 
 Tathagata shines forth when displayed" (p. 264), 
 which is contrasted with the injunction, " Do not let 
 the Dharma .... fall into the hands of those un- 
 versed with it " (page 266). Both passages find their 
 parallels in the Christian Gospel, the former in Mat- 
 thew V. 16, ^' Let your light shine before men," and 
 the latter in Matthew vii. 6, " Do not cast your 
 pearls before swine." 
 
 Buddha says (in the Sutra of Forty-two Sections^ 
 28) " Guard against looking on a woman," and (in 
 Buddhaghosha's Parables^ p. 153) he comments upon 
 the law " commit no adultery," that it " is broken 
 by even looking at the wife of another with a lustful 
 mind." Christ expresses the same idea in almost 
 the same words, saying : " Whosoever looketh on a 
 woman to lust after her, has committed adultery with 
 her already in his heart." (Matthew v. 28.) 
 
 The sentence, " If thy right eye offend thee pluck 
 it out," (Matthew v. 29), finds a parallel in the words : 
 
 *' Better far with red-hot iron pins bore out both your eyes, 
 than encourage in yourself lustful thoughts. " (Ashvaghosha's 
 Life of Buddha, 1762-1763. ) 
 
184 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 " The armor of God " is described by St. Paul 
 (Eph. vi. 13-17) : 
 
 " Wherefore, take unto you the whole armor of God, that ye 
 may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, 
 to stand. 
 
 '* Stand, therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, 
 and having on the breastplate of righteousness ; 
 
 " And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of 
 peace; 
 
 • ' Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall 
 be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked, 
 
 "And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the 
 Spirit, which is the word of God." 
 
 This reminds us of Ashvaghosha's Life of Buddha^ 
 1761-1762 : 
 
 " Take, then, the bow of earnest perseverance, and the sharp 
 arrow-points of wisdom. 
 
 "Cover your head with the helmet of right thought, and 
 fight with fixed resolve against the five desires." 
 
 In the Lalita Vistara (page 122) we read of the 
 " World " that " it is like a city of sand. Its founda- 
 tions cannot endure," which reminds us of Matthew 
 vii. 26. 
 
 Matthew xxiv. 35 : " My words shall not pass 
 awaj^," finds a parallel in Buddhist Birth Stories^ 
 p. 18 : " The word of the glorious Buddhas is sure 
 and everlasting." 
 
 Both Buddha and Christ point out to their ad- 
 herents the good example of worldly people. 
 Buddha says, when rebuking his disciples for im- 
 proper behavior : 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 185 
 
 ** Even the laymen, O bhikkhus .... will be respectful, 
 affectionate, hospitable to their teachers. Do you, therefore, 
 O bhikkhus, so let your light shine forth that you having left 
 the world .... may be respectful, affectionate, hospitable 
 to your teachers," etc. (Mahdvagga V. 4, 2, xvii. p. 18.) 
 
 And Christ says : 
 
 "If ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? 
 Do not even the publicans the same ? And if ye salute your 
 brethren only, what do ye more than others ? Do not even 
 the publicans so ? " (Matth. v. 46-47.) 
 
 Christ complains, in Matth. xi. 16-19, of the 
 childish nature of the people whom no one can 
 satisfy, neither John the Baptist who did not eat 
 and drink nor the Son of man who did eat and drink. 
 In the same spirit Buddha says : 
 
 " They blame the man of many words, they blame the pa- 
 tient and quiet man, they also blame the man who seeks the 
 happy medium." (See Beal's Translation of the Chinese 
 Dhammapadaf sect. xxv. p. 123. Compare Pdli Dhamma- 
 pada, V. 227). 
 
 It is a curious coincidence that Christ, when speak- 
 ing of the signs of the coming of the Son of Man, 
 mentions " the tig tree's putting forth leaves " (Matt, 
 xxiv. 32), while we read in the Saddharma-jpunda- 
 rika, ii. 134-136, S. B. of E., p. 58 : 
 
 "At certain times and at certain places, somehow do leaders 
 
 appear in the world just as the blossom of the glomer- 
 
 ous fig-tree is rare, all so wonderful, and far more wonderful 
 is the law I proclaim." 
 
 As the coming of the Son of man, so his parting 
 
186 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 from life is expressed in words which present a cer- 
 tain similarity to Buddhistic passages. Christ says : 
 
 "Ye shall not see me" (St. John. xvi. 16), 
 
 and again (Matt. xxiv. 23.) 
 
 ** If any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there, 
 believe it not." 
 
 The Brahmajdla Sutta (translated by Gogerly in 
 Sept Suttas Palis, p. 59) although in a different 
 sense also speaks of Buddha that he shall not be 
 seen again. We read : 
 
 *• That which binds the teacher to existence is cut off, but 
 his body still remains. While his body still remains he will 
 be seen by gods and man, but after the termination of life, 
 upon the dissolution of the body, neither gods nor men will 
 see him." (P. iii.) 
 
 Self-sacrifice is the lesson of Christ's death ; the 
 same lesson is taught by Buddha in one of the Sam- 
 kaapala birth stories, wnere he offers himself for 
 food to a hungry Brahman. Buddha says : 
 
 " They pierced me through with pointed sticks, 
 They hacked me with their hunting knives, 
 Yet 'gainst these Bhojans raged I not, 
 But kept the precepts perfectly."* 
 
 A similar passage occurs in the Greater Sutasoma 
 Birth-story, where Buddha says : 
 
 *' I kept the promise I had made 
 And gave my life in sacrifice." 
 
 ♦Warren, p. 35. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 187 
 
 At the close of his career Buddha promised that, 
 when Deeded, another Buddha would arise who will 
 be known as Meitreya, he whose name is kindness, 
 and in a similar mood Christ prophesies the coming 
 of the Comforter, that will guide them into all truth 
 and complete his work. 
 
 "While the resemblances between Christ and Bud- 
 dha are exceedingly great, there is a passage in the 
 Epistle of St. James which has puzzled all transla- 
 tors, because it contains a Buddhist term which 
 was no longer understood among Christians. The 
 endless circuit of becoming is compared to a wheel, 
 in the hands of Mara, the Evil One, which is fre- 
 quently painted by Buddhist artists. St. James 
 speaks of the tongue as a fire, saying : " Behold how 
 great matter a little fire kindleth. He continues : 
 
 ovTug T/yXcjaaa KadlaTaraL hv TOig fiiXeotv rjfiHiv, rj cinAovaa bXov to acj/ia 
 Kol (pXoyil^ovGa rbv rpoxov TrJQ yeveaecoc;, Kac (l>Xoyi^ojj.£v?] vrrb TTjg yeivv^g. 
 
 [Thus the tongue that defileth the whole body standeth 
 among our limbs, and it sets on fire the wheel of becom.ing 
 and is set on fire by hell.] 
 
 The Latin version retains the term rota nativi- 
 tatis. " The wheel of being born," but the English 
 version of King James replaces the term by " course 
 of nature." The reappearance of this peculiarly 
 Buddhist term in the New Testament is certainly 
 most startling and perplexing. 
 
 CHRISTIAN AND BrDDHISTIC SENTIMENTS. 
 
 There is a strange agreement between Christian 
 and Buddhistic sentiment as expressed in hymns and 
 
188 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHKISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 religious poetry. The well-known crusader's song 
 which, it is said, was sung by Christian warriors on 
 their march to Palestine, to a beautiful rhythmic 
 march-melody, concludes with the following verse : 
 
 " Fair is the moonshine, 
 Fairer the sunlight 
 
 Than all the stars of the heavenly host. 
 Jesus shines brighter, 
 Jesus shines purer 
 Than all the angels that heaven can boast." 
 
 How much does this resemble the following verse 
 in the Dhammapada (verse 387) : 
 
 *' The sun is bright by day. 
 The moon shines bright by night, 
 The warrior is bright in his armor, 
 The Brahmana is bright in his meditation, 
 But Buddha, the awakened, 
 Is brightest with splendor day and night." * 
 
 There is not the slightest evidence that the crusa- 
 der's hymn is an echo of the verse of the Dhamma- 
 pada. How naturally similar sentiments develop 
 under the same conditions of mind may be learned 
 from the following poem which we quote from " The 
 Ten Theophanies," by the Rev. William M. Baker. 
 We take the liberty only of making a few changes 
 in the order of the verses and replace Christian 
 terms by Buddhistic expressions. The sentiment 
 remains unaltered and shows how thoroughly the 
 religious literature of the one religion can be utilized 
 
 * Sacred Books of the East, Vol. X, p. 89. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 189 
 
 for the other. The poem which may be entitled 
 either " Lifting the Yeil of Maya " or A Glimpse of 
 Nirvana," reads in its revised version as follows : 
 
 "Melt, oh thou film-flake, faster. 
 Rend, thou thin gauze, in two, 
 
 Buddha* overmaster. 
 Break in effulgence through I 
 
 1 know how very nearly 
 
 I draw unto thy realms. 
 I know that it is merely 
 
 A film which overwhelms 
 These eyes from rapturous seeing, 
 
 These ears from rapturous sound, 
 This self from Buddha-heing, 
 
 This life from broken bound. 
 O sacred light, o'erflow thee I 
 
 Rush ceons into one. 
 That earth and heaven may know the 
 
 Eternal rest begun ! " 
 
 THE MURDER OF PARENTS. 
 
 Eemarkable as these parallels are, some of which 
 are apparently incidental, some striking, some simply 
 curious, the list is by no means exhausted.f Let me 
 
 *The italics indicate the changes made. Line 3 reads in 
 the original "Eternal heaven, o'ermaster"; line 11, "This self 
 from God-like being"; line 13, "day" in place of " light"; and 
 line 14,"3eons" (which stands for the Buddhist term " kalpas") 
 in place of "Sabbaths." 
 
 f Rudolf Seydel calls attention to a curious similarity of 
 sound between important names, such as Maya and Maria, 
 Ananda and Johannes, Sariputra and Peter, Devadatta, and 
 Judas, each two of these characters, strange to say, being re- 
 presentatives of the very same type and playing the same 
 parts, those in Buddha's, these in Christ's life. But we have 
 
190 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 now add a passage in which the Buddhist version 
 may be hoped to throw light upon the Christian 
 narrative. 
 
 Christ's words in Matth. x. 21," The children shall 
 rise up against their parents and cause them to be 
 put to death," have startled Christians in no less 
 degree than an analogous passage in the Buddhist 
 canon has the Buddhists. We read in the Dhammor 
 pada, verse 295 : 
 
 ** A true Brahman goes scathless, though he have killed 
 father and mother and two holy kings and an eminent man 
 besides." 
 
 Says the translator in the footnote on page 71 : 
 
 •*D' Alois following the commentary explains mother as 
 lust, father as pride, the two valiant kings as heretical sys- 
 tems, etc." 
 
 And Beal quotes in the Introduction to his Trans- 
 lation of the Chinese Dhammajpada the following 
 Buddhistic comment : 
 
 •*Is not love (Tanhd) which covets pleasure more and 
 more, and so produces ' birth ' — is not this the mother {mdtd) 
 of all? And is not 'ignorance' (avidyd) the father (pitd) of 
 all? To destroy these two, then, is to slay father and 
 mother. And again, to cut off and destroy those ten *kleshas^ 
 
 to add that the names Miryam, and Simeon Kephas, the 
 Hebrew originals of Maria and Peter, resemble their Bud- 
 dhistic counterparts very little and exhibit a remarkable in- 
 stance of an incidental resemblance warning us not to take 
 even striking coincidences as evidences of appropriation. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 191 
 
 (Ch. shi) which like the rat or the secret poison, work in- 
 visibly, and to get rid of all the consequences of these faults 
 (i. e., to destroy all material associations), this is to wound a 
 Rahat. And to cause offence and overthrow a church or 
 assembly, what is this but to separate entirely the connexion 
 of the five skandhas 9 (' five aggregates,' which is the same 
 word as that used above for the church). And again to draw 
 the blood of a Buddha, what is this but to wound and get 
 rid of the seven-fold body by the three methods of escape. 
 
 And in order to explain and enforce this more fully, 
 
 the World-honored One added the following stanzas : 
 
 Lust, or carnal desire, this is the mother, 
 
 ' Ignorance,' this is the father, 
 
 The highest point of knowledge, this is Buddha, 
 
 All the ' kleshas ' these are the Rahats. 
 
 The five skandhas, these are the priests. 
 
 To commit the five unpardonable sins 
 
 Is to destroy these five 
 
 And yet not suffer pains of hell." 
 
 Christ's startling prediction that "the children 
 will rise against their parents and cause them to be 
 put to death " bears an obvious likeness to these 
 Buddhistic passages and will, on the supposition of 
 an historical connexion between both religions, find, 
 if considered in the light of the above quotation, a 
 natural explanation. 
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF NON-EESISTANCE. 
 
 In pushing their doctrine of kindness and love of 
 enemies to the utmost extreme, both Buddha and 
 Christ seem to have had but little regard for the 
 ethics of struggle. We purposely say " seem," for 
 the doctrine of non-resistance is one of many para- 
 
y 
 
 192 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 doxes which admit of a perfectly satisfactory ex- 
 planation ; it has been interpreted by orthodox 
 Christian theologians and also by Buddhists to mean 
 that a man's disposition of heart must be such that 
 he does not defend his right because it is his, but 
 because it is right; that selfishness and personal 
 vanity must not be our motives of action ; and that 
 a man must be willing to give up, if need be, not 
 only what is taken from him, but other things in 
 addition. Thus we are told by Christian exegetists, 
 that Christ does not demand of us to give up the 
 mantle to him who robs us of our coat, for Christ 
 himself defended his right when unjustly beaten. 
 Christ himself carried on a bitter warfare against 
 those whom he called hypocrites, and generations 
 of vipers. He showed the belligerent spirit of his 
 zeal when he cast out those who bartered in the 
 temple and held pigeons for sale, which act was 
 probably an emphatic protest against bloody sacri- 
 fices, so extremely offensive to the Essene brother- 
 hood. And Buddha, too, with all his gentleness, 
 was himself a powerful, although always kind- 
 hearted, controversialist ; and his disciples are fre- 
 quently compared to warriors Avho with spiritual 
 weapons had unflaggingly and zealously to struggle 
 for the truth. 
 
 THE SANGHA AND THE CHUECH. 
 
 . There are also striking resemblances in the devel- 
 I opment of the Sangha, or Buddhist brotherhood, 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 193 
 
 and the Church. Universality is a marked feature 
 of both religions. Thus Buddhism, as well as Chris- 
 tianity, is pos sessed of a mJssJQnary, spirit ; anxious 
 to let everybody partake of the blessing of their 
 religion, they sent out apostles to all known countries 
 of the earth. • Councils were held to settle disputes 
 as to the right doctrine. A sa cred literatu re origi- 
 nated first of the Master's sayings, with incidental 
 mentionings of the occasions on which they were 
 uttered ; and later hagiographers undertook to tell 
 the w^hole story of HIs^ life. There is an increasing 
 tendency perceptible in the development of both 
 Buddhistic and Christian thought, of more and 
 more exaff^eratinff the marvellous and of adding 
 legendary elements. The ancient Buddhist chaityas, 
 or assemblage halls, with nave, aisles, and apse, 
 bear a close resemblance to Christian churches ; and 
 the Buddhist wheel reappears as the rose window 
 above the main entrance of cathedrals. 
 
 There were monks in Buddhism long before 
 Christianity existed ; and Buddhist monks wear rough 
 garments, live under the same, or almost the same, 
 restrictions, have tonsures, and employ rosaries. 
 They live as hermits or in cloisters, and the clergy 
 of Tibet possess a hierarchy with institutions which 
 are quite analogous to that of the Roman Catholic 
 Church. They have processions, they baptize,* they 
 sprinkle with holy water, and use the confessional. 
 
 * It is difficult to say whether or not baptism was established 
 among the early Buddhists ; if so, it is probable that the cere- 
 mony is older than Buddhism, We find bathing in the Ganges 
 
194 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 There are analogies even of sects and heresies. 
 The Doketistic heresy believed that Christ, because 
 he was God, could have suffered no pain ; his whole 
 being was uncontaminated with material existence, 
 and his body was mere appearance, a sham — hence 
 the name of the sect from ^o/eiv, to seem. This view 
 is represented in the apocryphal " Gospel according 
 to St. Peter," in which we read (verse 10) : " And 
 they brought two malefactors and crucified the 
 Lord between them ; but he kept silence, Si^ feeling 
 no pain." Doketism is also one of the Buddhist 
 heresies, as may be learned from a passage quoted 
 from the Fo-^pmi^i-pan-hing^ an expanded render- 
 ing of the Parinirvdna-Sutra^ translated into 
 Chinese by Dharmaraksha {Sacred Boohs of the 
 East, Yol. XIX, p. 365, et seq). The Tathagata 
 says to Chunda, the smith : 
 
 *' To those who as yet have no knowledge of the nature of 
 Buddha, to these the body of Tathagata seems capable of suf- 
 fering, liable to want (but to others it is not so) ; at the time 
 when Bodhisattva received the offering of food and drink (he 
 was supposed to have eaten the food). ... so now having 
 received your offering, he will preach the law. But still, as 
 in the former case he ate not, so neither does he eat now." — 
 Transl. by Samuel Beal, I. c, p. 367. 
 
 There are two incidents which link Buddhism and 
 
 mentioned as a religious rite in Ashvagosha's Life of Buddha^ 
 verses 164-165. But no further explanation is given concern- 
 ing it. Was it an ablution, or did it symbolize the crossing of 
 the stream of samsara ? It is remarkable that St. Paul (I. Cor. 
 iv. 1-4) says that the crossing of the Red Sea was the baptism 
 of the children of Israel, 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 195 
 
 Christianity together, in a quite peculiar way. On 
 the one hand, Buddha has been received among the 
 Christian saints under the name of St. Josaphat,* 
 so that in this respect the followers of Buddha must 
 appear to Christians as a kind of a Christian sect, 
 however incomplete their dogmatic Christianity may 
 be. On the other hand Buddha prophesied that the 
 next Buddha after him would be Maitreya, the 
 Buddha of kindness, and without doing any violence 
 to Buddha's words, this prophecy may be said to be 
 fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth. Thus the Christians 
 may be said to be Buddhists that worship Maitreya 
 under the name of Christ. 
 
 THE MAIN DIFFERENCE. 
 
 The similarities of Christianity and Buddhism are I 
 the more remarkable as among the dissimilarities 
 there is one which exhibits an almost irreconcilable 
 contrast. All those members of the various Chris- 
 tian denominations who call themselves its orthodox 
 representatives, regard the belief in a personal God 
 (an Ishvara) as the foundation of their religious faith. 
 
 * Josaphat is a corruption of Bodhisattva. For a detailed 
 account of the Barlaam and Josaphat literature see Rhys 
 David's Buddhist Birth Stories, pp. xxxvi, et seq. Rhys Davids 
 says on p. xli : " It was Prof. Max Miiller, who has done so 
 much to infuse the glow of life into the dry bones of Oriental 
 scholarship, who first pointed out the strange fact — almost in- 
 credible, were it not for the completeness of the proof— that 
 Gotama, the Buddha, under the name of St. Josaphat, is now 
 officially recognized throughout the whole of Catholic Chris- 
 tendom as a Christian saint I " 
 
196 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 , No wonder that they characterize Buddha's religion 
 
 > as atheism, denouncing it as unsatisfactory, or even 
 
 ] nihilistic, and vigorously repudiate any kinship which 
 
 might be supposed to obtain between both creeds. 
 
 TheGod-idea, representing the ultimate authority 
 of conduct, is so fundamental in Christianity that 
 Christians cannot think of any atheistic religion ; 
 they actually identify religion with belief in God 
 and, indeed, we confess that it is remarkable how 
 Buddhists can dispense at all with the God-idea. 
 We grant that no religion can exist without a 
 ^ belief in the existence of an ultimate authority of 
 j conduct ; but in this sense Buddhism, too, teaches a 
 belief in God. The Abhidharma, or Buddhist phi- 
 losophy, distinctly rejects the idea of a creation by 
 an Ishvara, i. e., a personal Creator ; but it recog- 
 nizes that all deeds, be they good or evil, will bear 
 fruit according to their nature, and they teach that 
 this law, which is ultimately identical with the law 
 of cause and effect, is an i rreversible realit y ; that 
 there are no exceptions or deviations from it. Thus, 
 law takes to some extent the place of the God-idea, 
 A land Buddhists gain a personal attitude to it, similarly 
 Tf^ Christians do when speaking of God, in quite a 
 peculiar way. The doctrine of the Trikaya, or the 
 ^^ three bodies, teaches us that Buddha has three per- 
 I sonalitjes ; the first one is the Dharma-Kaya, or the 
 / body of the law : it corresponds to the Holy Ghost 
 in the Christian dogmatology. The second person- 
 ality is the Nirmana-Kaya, or the body of transfor- 
 mations ; it is transient in its various forms, and its 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 197 
 
 most important and latest appearance has been Gau- \ 
 tama Siddhartha. This corresponds to the second 
 person of the Christian, Trinity, to God the Son, or 
 Christ. But there is this difference : that the Kir- 
 mana Kaya appeared before Gautama Siddhartha in 
 many other incarnations and will reappear in this 
 and other worlds again ; for every one who has at- 
 tained enlightenment and reached the ideal of perfec- 
 tion is a Tathagata, a Buddha, a preacher of moral 
 truth. It is in agreement with this conception that 
 Philo speaks of Moses as a former incarnation of the 
 Logos. The third personality of Buddha is called 
 Sambhoga-Kaya, or the body of bliss. It is the 
 Christian idea of God the Father. Buddha in his 
 capacity as Sambhoga-Kaya is described as eternal, 
 omnipresent, and omnipotent. He is the life of all 
 that lives and the reality of all that exists. Thus he 
 is the All in All, in whom we live and move and have 
 our being. 
 
 Buddhistic atheism, apparently, is not wholly un- j 
 like Christian theism. 
 
 Christianity possesses in the idea, and, indeed, in 
 the very word " God/' representing the authority of 
 moral conduct, in a most forcible manner, a symbol 
 of invaluable importance ; it is an advantage which 
 has contributed not a little to make Christianity so 
 powerful and popular, so impressive and effective as 
 it has proved to be. In this little word " God," 
 much has been condensed, and it contains an un- 
 fathomable depth of religious comfort. 
 
 No serious thinker who has ever grappled with 
 
198 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 the problem of the God-idea can have any doubt 
 that the conception of God as an individual being is 
 a mere allegory, which, however, symbolizes a great 
 truth which it is difficult to explain to untrained minds 
 in purely scientific terms. There is a disadvantage 
 and there is also an advantage in mythological terms. 
 Let us here as everywhere learn from various methods 
 of presenting a truth. Let us prove all and hold fast 
 that which is good. 
 
 BUDDHISTIC ART. 
 
 The spirit of Buddhism also exhibits a palpable 
 aflinity with Christian conceptions in its art pro- 
 ductions, which, we have every reason to believe, 
 originated uninfluenced by either the technique or 
 the taste of the Western civilization. The difference 
 between Western and Eastern taste is as strongly 
 marked in religious art as in the other walks of life. 
 Nevertheless there is an unmistakable coincidence 
 of aspiration, which will strike any one who visits 
 the Buddhistic departments of the Musee Guimet at 
 Paris, or glances over the Illustrated Guide of its 
 collections. We reproduce here a few pictures which 
 seem to us especially instructive, because they ex- 
 press sentiments which are not foreign to the student 
 of Christian art. 
 
 1. Mi-ro-Kou, or Maitreya, the Buddha to come, 
 of gilded wood (Sixteenth Century), seated upon a 
 lotus in an attitude as if ready to rise and proclaim 
 to the world the Gospel of the Good Law. The halo 
 
I. Mi-Ru-Kou, or Maitreya. 
 

 2. BODHISATTVA 
 
fwiliigil| »li»i i ^^ 
 
 3. Sam-b6. 
 
4- KOUAN-YIN. 
 
5- Amida (Buddha Amitabha). 
 
6. The Devil as a Buddhistic Monk. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 199 
 
 round his head and the divinely glorious attitude of 
 his whole person remind us of Roman Catholic con- 
 ceptions of Christ, such as can be found in abun- 
 dance in all Catholic countries, especially in Southern 
 Europe and in the Spanish colonies of America. 
 
 2. Bodhisattva, the teacher of the law, also of 
 gilded wood (Fifteenth Century), stands upon the 
 lotus in the attitude of a preacher. In contrast to the 
 statue of Mi-ro-Kou it emphasizes the human in 
 Buddha and reminds us of the Protestant conception 
 of Christ, which found its noblest representation in 
 Thorwaldsen-s famous statue. 
 
 3. Sam-bo, or the Buddhistic trinity, again repre- 
 senting Roman Catholic taste, shows the three jewels, 
 the Buddha, the Dharma, and the Sangha. The 
 Dharma (in one sense the Christian logos, in another 
 the Holy Ghost) being most appropriately repre- 
 sented by written words, nor is it impossible that 
 its higher position may indicate a certain superiority 
 over the Buddha and the Sangha. For the Buddha 
 is the incarnation and the Sangha the continued pro- 
 clamation of the Dharma. 
 
 4. Kouan-yin, a peculiar conception of Buddha 
 (made of porcelain), represents Buddha in one of his 
 female incarnations as the goddess of charity and 
 motherly love. The resemblance to Roman Catholic 
 representations of Mary, the mother of Christ, is ob- 
 vious, and the coincidence loses none of its force 
 when we consider that the mythological conception 
 of Kouan-yin is radically different from that of Mary. 
 Buddha is conceived not as the object of motherly 
 
200 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 love, not as the infant, but as Love itself. The 
 statues on both sides of the chair are Hoang-tchen- 
 sai, the disciple of Kouan-yin, and Loung-nou, the 
 servant of Kouan-yin ; the former in an attitude of 
 worship, the latter holding in his hands a luminous 
 pearl. The necklace of Kouan-yin contains an orna- 
 ment in the shape of a cross of the Kenaissance. 
 
 5. Amida (Buddha Amitabha), of carved wood and 
 gilded (Twelfth Century), an art production of the 
 Tendai sect. The statue exhibits a softness of outline 
 that reminds of Kouan-yin. Buddha's attitude and 
 the grace of his appearance is here almost womanly, 
 and might among Eoman Catholics serve as a statue 
 of the Virgin. 
 
 6. The Devil as a Buddhistic monk, carved wood 
 of the Seventeenth Century, finds many parallel 
 productions on the pinnacles of Gothic cathedrals. 
 There is little probability that the Japanese artist 
 who, with great ingenuity and humor, sculptured 
 this admirable statue, ever heard of Kabelais, whose 
 verse from Book lY, chapter xxiv, has become an 
 English proverb, which, according to Bartlett's Fa- 
 rmUar Quotations, page 772, reads as follows : 
 
 When the Devil was sick, the Devil a monk would be : 
 When the Devil was well, the devil a monk was he." 
 
 There is not only an obvious similarity in the re- 
 ligious ideas and objects of devotion, but even in 
 religious satire, which cannot be explained by imita- 
 tion, but must have originated independently in 
 Buddhism as in Christianity. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 201 
 
 THE CONNEXIONS BETWEEN THE EAST AND WEST. 
 
 The question whether Christianity and Buddhism 
 have a common origin is perhaps less important than 
 it appears, yet there attaches to it a peculiar interest 
 because there is a numerically very strong section of 
 Christians who would not allow that the noble 
 ethical maxims of Jesus of ISTazareth could have de- 
 veloped according to the laws of nature in the 
 normal progress of evolution. There is certainly r 
 very little probability of a borrowing on the part of ! 
 Buddhism, as it is in all its essential features consid- | 
 erably older than Christianity. Buddha lived in 
 the fifth century before Christ. The Buddhistic 
 canon was settled at the time of the second council 
 which took place about 250 B. C, and Ashoka's rock 
 inscriptions, which contain the gist of Buddha's doc- 
 trine and testify to its established existence, date 
 from the same period. This excludes at once the 
 supposition that Buddhism is indebted to Chris- 
 tianity for its lofty morality and the purity of its 
 ideals. 
 
 We must add that it remains not impossible 
 (although not probable) that Buddhism, as it de- 
 veloped in its later phases in the North, has received 
 from Christianity some modes of worship for which 
 there would have been no place in the older Budd- 
 hism. Thus,Prof. Samuel Beal believes that Christian 
 ideas and forms of worship must have been imported 
 into Northern India as early as 60 A.D. He con- 
 siders it as highly probable that King Gondoforus of 
 the Legenda Aurea is identical with Gondophares, 
 
202 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 the founder of the Scythian dynasty in Seistan Yan- 
 dahar and Sindh, coins of whose reign are mentioned 
 by General Cunningham. {Ai^eh. Survey of Ind., 
 II, p. 59.) Professor Beal trusts that the old legend 
 of St. Thomas's visit to India is confirmed ; he does 
 not consider, however, the possibility, which is not 
 improbable, that the legend of St. Thomas may, like 
 the St. Josaphat story, be a Christianized Buddhist 
 legend. We waive the question and confine our- 
 selves to stating that the evidences which Professor 
 Beal introduces to prove the possibility of a Christian 
 influence upon later Buddhism go still farther to es- 
 tablish the possibility of a Buddhistic influence upon 
 Judea before the time of Christ's appearance. Pro- 
 fessor Beal says (p. 133-134) : 
 
 *' The Parthian prince, Pacorus, was, as Josephus tells us, in 
 possession of Syria and at Jerusalem. . . . Then again, the 
 marriage of Chandragupta with a daughter of Seleucus, and 
 the apparent knowledge possessed by the grandson of Chan- 
 dragupta, the great Asoka, with the Greek King Antiochus, 
 and his embassy to four other Greek kings, — all this shows 
 that there must have been some connexion between India and 
 the Western world, from the time of the establishment of 
 Greek influence in the valley of the Oxus." 
 
 There were plenty of channels through which 
 Buddhist doctrines could reach Palestine. 
 
 Speaking of the similarity between the Buddhist 
 story of the wise judge and the account of Solomon's 
 judgment, as told in the Book of Kings, Prof. Khys 
 Davids mentions the commercial relations that 
 obtained in those early days between Judea and 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 203 
 
 India. He says {Buddhist Birth Stories ^ pp. xlvi.- 
 xlvii.) : 
 
 "The land of Ophir was probably in India. The Hebrew- 
 names of the apes and peacocks said to have been brought 
 thence by Solomon's coasting-vessels are merely corruptions 
 of Indian names. . . . But any intercourse between Solomon's 
 servants and the people of Ophir must, from the difference of 
 language, have been of the most meagre extent ; and we may 
 safely conclude that it was not the means of the migration of 
 our tale. 
 
 *' Though the intercourse by sea was not continued after 
 Solomon's time, gold of Ophir, ivory, jade, and Eastern gems 
 still found their way to the West ; and it would be an interest- 
 ing task for an Assyrian or Hebrew scholar to trace the evi- 
 dence of this ancient overland route in other ways." 
 
 In order to prove the possibility of an exchange 
 of thought between India and Judea, it is not even 
 necessary to fall back upon these old commercial 
 relations which are difficult to trace, for we know 
 for sure that since Alexander's time the connexions 
 between the East and the West in general, and espe- 
 cially between Buddhist countries and Judea, were 
 quite intimate. Ashoka's rock inscriptions alone are 
 sufficient to prove that official legations had been 
 dispatched from India to the most important neigh- 
 boring countries and to Western Asia for the sole 
 purpose of making a strong propaganda for Buddha's 
 religion and the Buddhistic principles of universal 
 kindness and compassion for the suffering. The 
 second edict mentions a leo^ation to Kins: Antiochus 
 for mere humanitarian purposes. It reads as fol- 
 lows: 
 
204 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 " Everywhere in the kingdom of the king Priyadarshin,* be- 
 loved of the gods, and (among those) who (are) his neighbors, as 
 the Codas, the Pandyas, the prince of the Satiyas, the prince of 
 Karalas Tamraparni, theYavanas f king Antiochus and (among 
 the) others who (are) the vassal kings of Antiochus — every- 
 where the king Priyadarshin, beloved of the gods, founded two 
 (kinds of) hospitals— hospitals for men and hospitals for ani- 
 mals. Wherever there were no healing herbs to be found, 
 whether herbs fit for men or herbs fit for animals, to all such 
 places and in all such places, he issued orders to have such 
 herbs brought and planted. Also where there were no healing 
 roots and fruits he issued orders to have (them) brought and 
 planted. And along the roads he had trees planted and wells 
 dug for the use of man and beast.*' 
 
 The thirteenth edict speaks directly of a mission- 
 ary legation for spreading Buddha's religion. The 
 first part of the inscription is mutilated. The Ger- 
 man translator, Professor BUhler, says that from the 
 few correctly read words of a version of the same 
 edict preserved near Shahbazgarhi, and from the 
 fragment of the Ginar inscription, the thought of 
 the missing lines can be restored. Having expressed 
 remorse at the atrocities committed before his con- 
 version in Kaliriga, the king states that it is his in- 
 tention from now on to make no more conquests by 
 the sword, but is determined to take from his free 
 neighbors everything that can possibly be endured. 
 He adds that even the wild tribes in the forest ought 
 to be participants of this kindness, and concludes 
 with the remark that he has no other desire than to 
 
 * This is the customary appellation of Ashoka. 
 f The Yavanas are the Greeks. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 205 
 
 treat all beings with indulgence, justice, and clem- 
 ency. The part still extant reads : 
 
 " (The beloved of the gods wishes) . . . for all creatures 
 . . . forbearance, justice, and clemency ! But the follow- 
 ing is judged of the greatest consequence by the beloved of 
 the gods, namely, conquest by the law (Dhammavijaye.) This 
 conquest is made by the beloved of the gods as well here (in 
 his own kingdom) as among all his neighbors. For at a dis- 
 tance of six hundred Yojanas lives the (king) of the Yavanas 
 (Greeks) , called Amtiyoga (Antiochus) his neighbor, and be- 
 yond him are four, 4, kings, one named Tulamaya (Ptolemaeus), 
 one called Aikyashudala (Alexander) ; (further), towards the 
 South the Codas (Colas) and the Pamdiyas (Pandyas) as far as 
 Tambapamni (Ceylon), likewise the Hida king among the 
 Vishas (Bais), and Vajis (Vrijis), the Yavanas (the Greeks) and 
 the Kambo j as (Kabulis), among the Nabha tribes of Nabhaka, 
 among the Bhojas and Pitinikas, among Andhras and Pliadas 
 (Puliadas) — everywhere is the doctrine of the law of the be- 
 loved of the gods followed. Even those to whom the envoys 
 of the beloved of the gods do not go, follow the law, as soon 
 as they have heard the comments issued by the beloved of the 
 gods according to the law, his sermon of the law, and they 
 shall follow it in the time to come. The conquest which by 
 this means is everywhere accomplished fills (me) with a feeling 
 of joy. Firmly founded is (this) joy, the joy at the conquest 
 by the law. But (this) joy is in sooth merely something 
 slight. The beloved of the gods holds that only of worth 
 which has reference to the Beyond. But this religious edict 
 was written for the following purpose. To what purpose ? 
 That my sons and grandsons (to the end of time) shall deem 
 no other kind of conquest desirable, that if a conquest by 
 weapons should be absolutely necessary they should exercise 
 mercy and clemency, and that they shall only regard conquest 
 by the law as real conquest. Such a (conquest) brings salva- 
 tion here to you. But all (its joy) is the joy of effort. This, 
 too, brings salvation here and beyond."* 
 
 * Translated from the Zeitsch. fiir Morgenl. Gesellschaft, Vol, 
 XIV. pp. 135, 136, 
 
206 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Thus there cannot be the slightest doubt that 
 Buddhist missionaries were sent to Western Asia in 
 the third century before the Christian era and must 
 have made attempts to preach Buddhism. 
 
 Concerning the importation of Buddhist tales, Pro- 
 fessor Rhys Davids says (p. xliii.) : 
 
 " We only know that at the end of the fourth, and still more 
 in the third, century before Christ there was constant travel- 
 ling to and fro between the Greek dominions in the East and 
 the adjoining parts of India, which were then Buddhist, and 
 that the birth stories, viz., the Jataka were already popular 
 among the Buddhists in Afghanistan, where the Greeks re- 
 mained for a long time." 
 
 Shall we assume with Rhys Davids that a great 
 number of Jataka tales, such as the legend of the 
 Kisa-Gotami,* the story of the ass in the lion's skin, 
 the jackal and the crow, and other prototypes of the 
 so-called ^sopean fables, found their way to Greece, 
 there to reappear in Greek literature, while the main 
 ideas of Buddha's religion remained utterly unknown 
 in the West ? IS'o Western traveller, we are bid to 
 believe, ever heard of them in the East, and no East- 
 ern traveller ever mentioned them in the West. And 
 yet we know that the Buddhists were burning with 
 zeal for propagating their religion, and the Sangha 
 sent out missionaries into all quarters of the world. 
 It would be stranoe if Buddhist missionaries had 
 gone to all neighboring countries except to Palestine, 
 and that all kinds of Buddhist stories and wise saws 
 
 *See Jacob H. Thiessen, Die Legends von Kisd-Gotami, Bres- 
 lau, 1880, 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 207 
 
 were translated into other tongues, but not the essen- 
 tial doctrines of their sacred literature. 
 
 POSSIBLE BUDDHISTIC ORIGIN. 
 
 The probability that an influx of Buddhistic doc- 
 trines took place is very strong ; nevertheless we do 
 not press the theory that Christianity was influenced 
 b}^ Buddha's religion, but regard it as a mere hypoth- 
 esis. Here is a proposition of how matters might 
 have been : 
 
 It is certain that Buddhist missionaries, had they 
 come to Palestine, would not have attacked the reli- 
 gion of the country, but would, in accordance with 
 their traditional policy, have adapted themselves as 
 much as possible to the current ideas of the people. 
 They would have preached the gospel of Buddha, 
 and would have tried to proclaim their message in 
 the very terms of the Jewish creed. The soil was 
 prepared for them by Isaiah and other prophets who 
 objected to bloody sacrifices. It would be quite in 
 accord with their methods pursued in other countries 
 to adopt the Messiah idea, and to embody the Jewish 
 notions into their faith. The Buddhist missionaries 
 did not cling to Gautama Siddhartha ; they would 
 always be as ready to preach the Buddha of the past 
 as the Buddha to come. Since Buddha himself had 
 proclaimed the coming of Maitreya, the Buddha of 
 Kindness, must it not have appeared possible to Bud- 
 dhists living in Judaea and observing the religious 
 earnestness of the Jews, that Maitreya Avas to rise 
 
208 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 among the Jews ? This would explain not only the 
 origin of the Essene movement, which otherwise 
 appears very obscure, but also the change of the 
 worldly idea of a Jewish Messiah into the conception 
 of a spiritual saviour of the whole human race from 
 sin. The first symptoms of this change are found 
 already in the Jewish Apocrypha, especially in the 
 book of Esdras, in which " the Son of David" begins 
 to be called " the Son of Man," an expression that 
 was adopted by Jesus. The great mass of the Jews 
 of the time of Jesus still expected a Messiah who 
 would be like Judas Maccabaeus, a warrior and a 
 worldly king, a redeemer from foreign oppression, 
 yet the Essenes and the disciples of John regarded 
 the various dignities which tradition attributed to 
 the Messiah, as mere similes. In their idea the Mes- 
 siah would be an ascetic hermit and a wandering 
 preacher, more like Buddha than like Herod, for his 
 kingdom was not of this world ; he was the Dhar- 
 maraja, the king of truth. 
 
 As the Brahman god, Brahma, continued to play 
 an important part in the Buddhist mythology, so we 
 ought to expect that Buddhist missionaries would 
 not have attempted to deny the existence of Jehovah. 
 Yet, knowing the sternness of Jewish monotheism, 
 we can understand that the Jewish God could not 
 take a place inferior to Buddha ; and as Buddha on 
 the other hand was superior to all gods, both God 
 and Buddha could only be identified, so that Christ 
 could say : " I and the Father are one." 
 
 Considering the fact that later Buddhism devel- 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 209 
 
 oped out of its own elements a cosmic authority of 
 conduct which practically serves the same purpose 
 as the Christian God-idea, we cannot regard it as 
 strange that Buddhists who lived in Judaea should 
 have adapted the Jewish theism to the trikaya of 
 their own faith. The result could only be a trinity 
 conception such as taught by the church.* 'Now if 
 a Buddhist brotherhood had settled in Judaea, they 
 would have recruited themselves from Jews, and we 
 can fairly assume that they naturally would have 
 set on foot a movement like that of the Essen es, 
 and the first Christian society at Jerusalem with 
 its communistic ideals, its martyr spirit, and its in- 
 vincible faith in the kingdom of truth. 
 
 Prof. F. Max Mliller, who, when he first became 
 acquainted with Buddhism, was a severe critic of, 
 its doctrines, has gradually changed his views and 
 has at last, in spite of himself, come to the conclu-^ 
 sion that Christianity has orig inatPid iiTidf^r BnHdhkt 
 influences. We here reproduce the report of the 
 lecture of his, published in the Journal of the 
 Mahabhodi Society. 
 
 " Professor Max Miiller lectured at the rooms of 
 the Eoyal Society of Literature, Hanover Square, 
 
 * The development of the Christian Trinity is still shrouded in 
 darkness. We know from passages in the Apocryphal Gospels 
 that the Holy Ghost was identified by some of the old Christians 
 with the Logos ; and some considered the Third Person of the 
 Deity as a feminine presence and the Mother of Christ. 
 H 
 
210 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 London, on " Coincidences." The Lord Chancellor 
 took the chair, and there was a large company of 
 ladies and gentlemen, including the Eev. Canon 
 "Wilberforce. 
 
 " The Professor said that two Koman Catholic mis- 
 sionaries travelling in Thibet were startled at the 
 coincidence between their own ritual and that of 
 the Buddhist priesthood. The latter had crosiers, 
 mitres, dalmatics, copes, services with two choirs, 
 five-chained censers, blessings given while extending 
 the right hand over the people, the use of beads, 
 worship of the saints, processions, litanies, holy 
 water. The missionaries attributed these coinci- 
 dences to the Devil, determined to scandalize pious 
 Eoman Catholics. There the matter rested. 
 
 *' When the ancient language of the Brahmins be- 
 gan to be seriously studied by such men as Wilkins, 
 Sir William Jones, and Colebrooke, the idea that 
 all languages were derived from Hebrew was so 
 firmly fixed and prevalent that it would have re- 
 quired great courage to say otherwise. Frederic 
 Schlegel was the first to announce that the classic 
 languages of Greece and Italy, and Sanskrit, the 
 sacred language of India, were oiffshoots of the same 
 stem. It might be laid down as a general principle 
 that if a coincidence could be produced by natural 
 causes, no other explanation need be sought. This 
 however, could not be the reason why mitres, cope?, 
 dalmatics, crosiers, and many other things, exactly, 
 like those in the Koman Catholic Church, existed in 
 Thibet. The conclusion was forced upon those who 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 211 
 
 first studied the subject without passion, that there 
 must at one time have been communication between 
 Catholic priests and the Buddhists, and it was an 
 historical fact that Christian missionaries were active 
 in China from the middle of the seventh to the end 
 of the eighth century. They had monasteries and 
 schools in different towns, and were patronized by 
 the Government. Here, then, was a coincidence 
 explained in a fairly satisfactory manner. 
 
 " Other coincidences between Buddhism and Chris- 
 tianity had been pointed out again and again, but 
 too often in the impassioned tone of theological 
 controversy. Coincidences between all the sacred 
 books of the world existed and Professor Miiller 
 ventured to say that they ought to be welcomed, 
 for surely no truth lost value because it was held 
 not only by ourselves but also by millions of human 
 beings whom we formerly called unbelievers. 
 
 " Some of the coincidences between Buddhism and 
 Christianity belonged to the ancient period of the 
 former. They included confessions, fasting, celibacy 
 of the priesthood, and even rosaries, and, as they 
 were honored in India before the beginning of our 
 era, it followed that if they had been borrowed the 
 borrowers were Christians. 
 
 " How, it might be asked, had knowledge of these 
 things been spread ! Through the fact that Budd- 
 hism in its essence was a missionary religion. We 
 heard of Buddhist missionaries being sent to every 
 part of the known world in the third century before 
 Christ. 
 
212 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 "Indian and Buddhist influences had long been 
 suspected in the ancient Greek fable and some parts 
 of the Bible. The story of the ass in the lion's skin 
 was to be found in Pali. Probably it was true that 
 the germs of some famous stories existed among our 
 Aryan ancestors before their separation, but the 
 form would be that of the proverb. Some difficulty 
 had been caused by the question whether the fables 
 common to Greece and India had travelled east or 
 west. The Greeks themselves never claimed that 
 kind of literature as their invention, though they 
 made it their own by clothing it in Greek forms. 
 Moreover, the fable had many traces of Eastern 
 origin, and they abounded in Sanskrit literature. 
 They were constantly appealed to in India, and 
 were incorporated in the sacred canon of the Budd- 
 hists. Formerly doubtful. Professor Max Mtiller 
 had, after conscientious study, become more and 
 more convinced that India was the soil that origin- 
 ally produced the fable as we knew it. 
 
 " Again there were in the Old and New Testaments 
 stories which had been traced to the Buddhist 
 Jataka, and, indeed, nobody could look at Buddhism 
 without finding something which reminded them of 
 Christianity. The Professor did not allude to things 
 essential to Christianity ; he spoke rather of the 
 framework. 
 
 " Under the disguise of St. Josaphat, Buddha him- 
 self had been raised to the rank of a saint in the 
 Koman Catholic Church, and the Professor saw no 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 213 
 
 reason why Buddha should not retain a place 
 among saints, not all of whom were more saintly 
 than he. 
 
 " The story of the judgment of Solomon occurred 
 in the Buddhist canon, but in a somewhat different 
 form. We read there of the man who had no children 
 by his first wife, but one son by his second wife. 
 To console the first he gave her the custody of the 
 child. After his death, each of the wives claimed 
 the boy. They went before Misaka. He directed 
 them to try which could pull the child from the 
 other by main force. As soon as he began to cry, 
 one of the women would pull no longer, and Misaka 
 declared that she was the true mother. The Profes- 
 sor considered this story truer psychologically than 
 the judgment of Solomon. To look upon the latter, 
 as actually dating from the time of Solomon, could 
 hardly commend itself to Hebrew scholars of the 
 present day. 
 
 " The parable of the Prodigal Son was found in the 
 Buddhist sacred books. So was the story of the 
 man who walked upon the water so long as he had 
 faith in his divinity, and began to sink when his 
 faith failed. Such a coincidence could not be set 
 down to accident, and it must be remembered that 
 the date of the Buddhist parable was anterior to 
 that told by St. Luke. 
 
 " Then there was the parable of the loaves and 
 fishes. In Buddha's case he had one loaf, and after 
 he had fed his five hundred brethren, as well as his 
 host and hostess and the people of a monastery, so 
 
214 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 much bread was left that it had to be thrown into a 
 cave. 
 
 " If such coincidences between the Buddhist sacred 
 books and the Bible could be accounted for by ref- 
 erence to the tendency of our common humanity, 
 let analogous cases be produced. If they were set 
 down as merely accidental, let similar cases be 
 brought from the chapter of accidents. 
 
 " Max Miiller's own opinion was that at least they 
 were too numerous and complex to be attributed to 
 the latter cause. He had tried to lay the case be- 
 fore his hearers like a judge summing up for a jury. 
 He would only ask them to remember that the 
 Buddhist canon in which these coincidences were 
 found, was certainly reduced to writing in the first 
 century before the Christian era. All, however, 
 that he felt strongly was that the case should not 
 remain undecided." * 
 
 It is often assumed that if the priority of Bud- 
 dhism were proved, it would imply that Christianity 
 would have to be regarded as a deteriorization of 
 Buddhism ; it would deprive Christianity of all claim 
 to originality, beauty, and truth. We might on the 
 same argument say that Anglo-Saxon is a degene- 
 rated form of Low German, or that the polar bear is 
 a degenerated species of the grizzly bear, or even that 
 civilized man is a deteriorated anthropoid. Chris- 
 tianity embodies in its world-conception the best 
 thoughts of the past frrm all quarters of the globe. 
 The Logos idea was derived from Neo-Platonism, 
 
 * Journ. Maha-Bodhi Soc, v, 4. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 215 
 
 the God-idea is a Jewish tradition, baptism an Es- 
 senian rite, the holy communion partly reminds us 
 of an ancient Larathustrian cult, partly appears to 
 be a substitution of bread oiferings in the place of 
 bloody sacrifices ; * the love of enemies was preached 
 in a similar form five centuries before Christ in the 
 far East. The idea of a world-Saviour is Buddhistic. 
 In a word, none of the elements of Christianity is 
 radically new ; nevertheless, the whole in its peculiar 
 
 * Justinus Martyr (Apol. I., 86), referring to a similar rite of 
 distributing bread among the worshippers and handing them 
 a chalice of water to drink that obtained among the Parsees, 
 accuses the Devil of aping the Lord. While it is not impos- 
 sible that the Parsees of Justinus's time had adopted some 
 features of the Christian Sacrament, it is certain that the in- 
 stitution of the haoma-offering was an old established ceremony 
 in Zarathustra's religion. It is of Aryan origin. Haoma is 
 the Vedic Soma, and the holy meat of Myazda, small pieces of 
 which were eaten on little cakes called " draona," consecrated 
 in the name of deceased persons, are the Vedic hotrd. And it 
 is said that he who drinks of the white haoma or Gao-kerena 
 will on the day of resurrection become immortal. (See 
 Darmstetter's Introduction to the Zend Avesta in S. B. of E., 
 IV. , p. Ixix and also the note on p. 56. ) Zarathustra calls ' ' the 
 sacred cup and the haoma the best weapons to strike and repel 
 the evil-doer Angra Mainya." {Ibid. p. 206.) 
 
 It is possible that among the Essenes of Palestine Buddhistic 
 influence replaced the intoxicating haoma by water, while the 
 Greek to whom wine was a symbol of holy enthusiasm again 
 changed the water into wine. 
 
 The original meaning of breaking the bread must have been 
 that in the new dispensation a loaf is sacrificed on the altar 
 and not an animal. The oldest account of the Lord's last 
 supper is found in Cor. xi. 23 et seq.,and it is noteworthy that 
 St. Paul neither mentions the Paschal Lamb nor the wine. 
 
216 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 combination is decidedly original and marks the be- 
 ginning of an era which, at least in the West, stands 
 I in strong contrast to all the ages past. 
 
 PARALLELISM WITH LAU-TSZE. 
 
 ) Although it is true that the coincidences between 
 Buddhism and Christianity are remarkable and 
 numerous, and that their differences are easily ac- 
 counted for, we will nevertheless concede that both 
 (religions may have originated independently. We 
 possess the strange case of a similar parallelism to 
 both Buddhism and Christianity in Lau-tsze's philo- 
 sophy which can hardly be suspected of being bor- 
 rowed from either. We quote a few passages from 
 his Tan Teh King^ which was written more than five 
 hundred years before Christ, and almost a century 
 before Buddha. The Chinese word tau bears a 
 peculiar likeness to the Greek term logos. It means 
 " word," " reason," and " path or way " at the same 
 time. The first sentence of the Tau Teh King 
 reminds us of the first verse of the fourth Gospel 
 in the E"ew Testament, and many other passages 
 breathe the spirit of Christian ethics. We read in 
 the Tau Teh King : 
 
 "The Tau (word, reason, path, or briefly logos) that can be 
 taued (reasoned, argued with, walked on, or spoken) is not the 
 Eternal Tau. The name which can be named is not the 
 Eternal Name. (Sec. 1.) 
 
 " Tau produced unity ; unity produced duality ; duality 
 produced trinity ; and trinity produced all things. (Sec. 42.) 
 
 " Lay hold on the great form (of Tau), and the whole world 
 will go to you. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHUISTIANITY. 217 
 
 *' Tau, in its passing out of the mouth, is weak and tasteless. 
 If you look at it there is nothing to fill the eye. If you listen 
 to it, there is nothing to fill the ear. But if you use it, it is 
 inexhaustible. (Sec. 35.) 
 
 "The great Tau is all-pervading. It can be on the right 
 hand and also at the same time on the left. All things wait 
 upon it for life, and it refuses none. When its meritorious 
 work is done, it takes not the name of merit. In love it 
 nourishes all things, and does not lord over them. It is ever 
 free from ambitious desires. It may be named with the 
 smallest. All things return home to it, and it does not lord 
 over them. It may be named with the greatest. 
 
 " This is how the wise man, to the last, does not make him- 
 self great, and therefore he is able to achieve greatness. 
 (Sec. 34.) 
 
 *' Recompense injury with goodness. (Sec. 63.) 
 
 " The Tau of Heaven may be compared to the extending of 
 a bow. It lowers that which is high, and it raises that which 
 is low. (Sec, 77.) 
 
 " He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is 
 enlightened. 
 
 " He who conquers others is strong. He who conquers 
 himself is mighty. 
 
 ** He who knows when he has enough is rich. (Sec. 33.) 
 
 " The good I would meet with goodness. The not-good I 
 would also meet with goodness. Virtue is good. The faith- 
 ful I would meet with faith. The not-faithful I would also 
 meet with faith. Virtue is faithful. (Sec. 49.) 
 
 " He that humbles (himself) shall be preserved entire. He 
 that bends (himself) shall be straightened. He that is low 
 shall be filled. He that is worn out shall be renewed. He 
 that is diminished shall succeed. He that is increased shall 
 be misled. Therefore the sage embraces Unity, and is a pat- 
 tern for all the world. He is not self -displaying, and, there- 
 fore, he shines. He is not self -approving, and, therefore, he 
 is distinguished. He is not self-praising, and, therefore, he 
 has merit. He is not self -exalting, and, therefore, he stands 
 high." (Sec. 23.) 
 
218 BUDDHISM AKD ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 The Buddhistic-Christian spirit of Lau-tsze's phi- 
 losophy is so striking that the suggestion has been 
 made to trace its origin to the same sources in India 
 from which Buddhism has sprung. But considering 
 the fact that Buddha is almost a hundred years 
 younger than Lau-tsze this assumption is barely 
 possible, not probable. And must we not grant that 
 the Christian ethics if true may naturally develop in 
 any country and in any age 2 
 
 NOTHING AND THE ALL. 
 
 There are many remarkable agreements of all 
 kinds which are due, not to a borrowing, but to a 
 similarity of the circumstances which give rise to an 
 idea or an event. So an Indian chief, who cannot 
 be suspected of ever having read Caesar, replied to 
 the invitation of the President of the United States 
 in almost literally the same terms as Ariovistus. 
 
 Among many peculiar coincidences of Buddhistic 
 conceptions with ideas of thinkers w^ho never came 
 in contact with Buddhistic traditions, let me mention 
 only one. Passerat, a late Latin poet of the sixteenth 
 century, a native of France, (as quoted by Charles 
 F. Neumann in his Catechism of the Shamcms, 
 London, Oriental Transl. Fund, 1831) says in one of 
 his verses : 
 
 " Nihil interitus et originis expers 
 Immortale Nihil, Nihil omni parte beatiun, 
 Felix cui Nihil est." 
 
 This expression, praising the happiness of him who 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 219 
 
 has attained " the Nothing which knows the begin- 
 ning and end of all things, the immortal nothing, 
 which is blessed throughout," would be natural in 
 the mouth of a Buddhist, to whom the word conveys 
 different associations than to us, but it is startling 
 when pronounced by a poet who in his surroundings 
 had no chance of hearing the praises of Kirvana. 
 
 A REACTION AGAINST DUALISM. 
 
 The similarity between Christianity and Buddhism I 
 must, at least to some extent, be due to a similarity ^ 
 of conditions. And such a similarity of conditions \ y^ 
 existed; yet here again we have good reason to -'''^ 
 believe that these very conditions were imported / 
 from India. If Buddhism was not directly transb_j 
 planted to Palestine, it still remains quite probable 
 that the seeds at least from which it sprang were 
 sown by Buddhists in the soil of Galilee. ^^ 
 
 The main basis of all the agreements between 
 Buddhism and Christianity lies in their similar at- 
 titude towards a dualistic and pessimistic world- 
 conception. It is sufficiently known how Buddhism 
 developed from the Samkhya system, and there can ' J 
 be no question that Christianity presupposes the -^ 
 prevalence of similar ideas in the minds of the people 
 among whom Jesus Christ lived and taught — not j 
 among the learned only but among the multitudesj 
 
 The Essenes formed a faction among the Jews 
 standing in opposition to both the conservative and 
 old orthodox Pharisees and the liberal and Hellen- 
 
220 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 ized Sadducees. All that is known about the Es- 
 senes reminds as of Buddhistic monk fraternities 
 and Hindu ascetics. There was a similar movement 
 in those days among the learned Jews of Alexandria, 
 which developed into Neo-Platonism, represented 
 mainly by Philo (who died 54 A. D.), Plotinus 
 (205-270), and Porphyry (232-304). 
 
 Lassen traces Neo-Platonism and Gnosticism back 
 to India, and Professor Weber suggests the deriva- 
 tion of the Graeco-Christian Logos-idea from the 
 Indian " Yach " (i. e., voice, speech, word), calling 
 attention to the fact that the divine " Yach," which 
 in Sanskrit is a feminine noun, appears in numerous 
 passages as the consort of Prajapati, the Creator, in 
 union with whom and by whom he accomplished his 
 creation. Professor Garbe, in his remarkable article 
 in The Monist (Yol. lY., No. 2), not only confirms 
 these suppositions, but, following Leopold von 
 Schroeder's suggestion, offers abundant evidence for 
 the derivation of Pythagoric views from the same 
 source, India, which thus seems to have been the 
 cradle of all our philosophies. 
 
 Two things seem certain, to which heretofore the 
 attention of investigators has not as yet been called : 
 that gnosticism, with all the kindred aspirations of 
 the therapeutge in Egypt and the Essenes in Pal- 
 estine, is a pre-Christian movement which prepared 
 the way for Jesus as well as for the missionary work 
 of the Apostle St. Paul and that this movement was 
 developed from seeds that had drifted into the West 
 from the religious life of India. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 221 
 
 We consider the hypothesis of a historical con- 
 nexion between Buddhism and Christianity as quite 
 probable ; yet at the same time must say that 
 whether it is true or not is of little consequence. 
 There are enough parallels concerning which we 
 can be sure that they are not due to a borrowing, 
 and such parallelism alone as obtains between Lau- 
 tsze on the one hand and Buddhism and Christianity 
 on the other hand, is sufficient to prove that the 
 evolution of both religious may have taken place 
 independently, according to a natural law. 
 
 Whether or not the Samkhya philosophy and its 
 offshoot. Buddhism, were transplanted from India 
 to the Western world, we find that the Hindus not 
 less than the Graeco-Judaean thinkers arrived at 
 a crisis in their religio-philosophical evolution in 
 which they perceived the difference between soul 
 and body, mind and matter, spirituality and sense- 
 appearing reality. This difference once understood, 
 leads easily to wrong conclusions. Before a monis- 
 tic solution of the problem is sought, the dualistic 
 view naturally presents itself first to a superficial 
 consideration as the simpler conception. It was 
 quite correct to regard mind as the all-import- 
 ant element of man's life, but it was a mis- 
 take, although it seemed quite plausible by way 
 of contrast, to look upon matter as the source of all 
 evil. Thus the Samkhya philosophers, and, in 
 agreement with them, the Neo-Platonists, believe in 
 the existence of two realities, matter and soul (or 
 rather souls, for they assume a boundless plurality 
 
222 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 of individual souls), while material existence is 
 looked upon as the cause of all misery and pain. The 
 body is said to be that which hampers the mind and 
 imprisons the soul as in a dungeon, while spiritual 
 existence, or that which produces the illumination 
 of consciousness in man, is praised as infinite perfec- 
 tion and divine bliss. Thus the world is cut in 
 twain, and the logical consequence of this dualism 
 is pessimism. This world of ours, the world of 
 bodily existence in which, as they say, the soul is 
 imprisoned, is a domain of suffering (note here also 
 the parallelism with Plato), and the highest aim of 
 human exertion must be salvation from the bondage 
 of matter. Hence asceticism and self-mortification. 
 The death of the body was longed for because prom- 
 
 / ising the liberation of the soul. Now Buddha, as 
 well as Christ, rejected pessimistic ethics ; yet it is 
 noteworthy that they did not denounce it as alto- 
 gether wrong ; they only forbade the enforcement 
 of it among their disciples, and regarded it as a 
 lower and insufficient method of attaining salvation, 
 or rather as a phase through which he who seeks 
 deliverance must pass. They themselves had passed 
 through it and rejected it. Therefore they suffered 
 
 I it still, but boldly disavowed its principles in their 
 Lo^n conduct. 
 
 Thus, in the dualism of both the Samkhya phi- 
 losophy and the Essen ic ethics, as also in Neo-Platon- 
 ism, a great truth, the idea of the all-importance of 
 mind, was linked to fatal errors, viz., the duality of 
 mind and matter, the fiction of a purely spiritual 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 223 
 
 empire, and the escape from the material world to 
 the spirit realm through the suppression and gradual 
 mortification — mortification in the literal sense of 
 the word, which means the reducing to a state of 
 being dead — of all bodily existence, 
 
 Buddha and Christ were confronted by the same / 
 dualism and facing the same problem of salvation, * 
 solved the problem in the same way. Both aban- 
 doned the traditional dualism and its pessimistic 
 applications. After having tried world-flight, fasts, 
 and self -mortification, they gave up all further 
 attempts at uplifting the mind by a vain struggle 
 against the body. Yet neither Buddha nor Christ 
 surrendered the truth contained in the dualism of 
 their predecessors. They recognized that the pur- 
 pose of life lay not in the sphere of material reality, 
 but in the realm of mind ; that the life is more than 
 meat, and that all worldly goods serve only as means 
 for our spiritual needs. As to the problem of evil, 
 they surrendered the dualistic method of deliverance 
 through asceticism for a monistic ethics of righteous- 
 ness. Both Buddha and Christ found that the source 
 of sin lay deeper than in the complications of mind 
 with matter ; that material existence is innocent of 
 wrong-doing, and that mind alone makes or mars 
 the world. Lust, vanity, and hatred do not reside 
 in the objects of our senses, but in our hearts. A 
 wrong-directed mind is the source of sin, and a puri- 
 fication of the mind from its sinful desires is the sole 
 condition of salvation. Accordingly, both Buddha 
 and Christ abandoned world-flight and self-mortiti- 
 
224 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 cation ; they both returned to the world and gave 
 offence to those who were still under the sway of 
 a dualistic morality ; they lived among the people, 
 preaching the new way of salvation and the attain- 
 ment of the kingdom of heaven that is within us. 
 
 In saying that Buddha and Christ abandoned the 
 ethics of dualism and proposed a new system of 
 morality that might properly be designated as mo- 
 nistic, we do not maintain that either Buddha or 
 Christ taught a monistic philosophy. Neither 
 Buddha nor Christ were philosophers, although the 
 former can be called a philosopher with more pro- 
 priety than the latter. Both were religious leaders ; 
 Christ more so than Buddha. Buddhism and Chris- 
 tianity are religions and not philosophies ; yet from 
 their first appearance when their founders began to 
 preach the new doctrine, they ushered in an era of 
 monistic thought. By discarding pessimistic prin- 
 ciples and proposing a melioristic morality they led 
 the way towards a monistic world-conception. The 
 philosophy underlying their religious faith already 
 shows a monistic trend. 
 
 As religions are slowly expanding and developing 
 in the course of their evolution, so they cannot have 
 originated without due preparation. Their growth 
 is due to natural causes and takes place according 
 [to natural laws. St. Paul is generally considered as 
 the founder of the Gentile Church ; however, the 
 existence of a Christian congregation in Kome to 
 which he addresses the most important one of his 
 epistles, is alone an undeniable evidence that he wa§ 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 225 
 
 one only among many missionaries of the new faith. 
 Apollos, it is said in Acts xviii. 24, " taught dili- 
 gently the things of the Lord, knowing only the 
 baptism of John," and Paul coming to Ephesus, 
 found "certain disciples who had not so much as 
 heard whether there was a Holy Ghost " and were 
 baptized unto John's baptism.* This is noteworthy. 
 It proves that there were at that time, when Chris- 
 tian missionaries began to preach, Christian-like 
 congregations who differed but slightly from those 
 baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. It is not im- 
 possible that such communities of so-called " disci- 
 ples " (which was also the name of the first Christians) 
 were scattered, even in the life-time of Christ, over 
 the whole Koman empire ; in other words, the germs 
 of Christianity existed before Paul organized them 
 into Christian churches. 
 
 As the Gentile Church originated before Paul, so 
 a pre-Christian Christianity must have begun to 
 grow before Jesus. ApoUonius of Tyana, is an 
 exponent of this spirit. He was in many respects 
 similar to Jesus of Nazareth, and the legends which 
 his pious admirers told of his life bear so much re- 
 semblance to the Christian Gospels and Apocrypha 
 that Christian fanatics have jealously destroyed the 
 greatest part of them.f In a similar way Buddhism 
 
 * Acts xix. 1-2. 
 
 t " After his death Apollonius was worshipped with divine 
 honors for a period of four centuries. A temple was raised 
 to him at Tyana, which obtained from the Romans the immu- 
 nities of a sacred city. His statue was placed among those of 
 15 
 
226 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 developed in India on parallel lines with Jainism. 
 If Gautama Siddhartha had not appeared, Jnyata- 
 putra, the founder of Jainism, might have taken his 
 place. Vice versa, if Buddhism which had grown 
 so much more powerful than Jainism, had not been 
 rooted out in India, might not Jainism have been 
 absorbed by it so as to disappear entirely ? And if 
 Jesus of Nazareth had not become the Christ of the 
 Western world, might not ApoUonius have played 
 a similar part in history ? We do not mean to say 
 that Apollonius was nearly as grand or sympathetic 
 a figure as Jesus, we only say that his character was 
 of that type from which mankind would be inclined 
 to select their Christs, their Buddhas, their Saviours. 
 He was in many respects suitable to serve as a centre 
 of religious crystallization, and the sacred legends 
 would have so moulded his personality as to make 
 of him an incarnation of the highest moral ideal of 
 the age. In other words, if Jesus had not appeared, 
 we might have substantially the same religion. 
 
 EVOLUTION IN RELIGION. 
 
 It is the habit of all religious devotees to look 
 
 the gods, and his name was invoked as a being possessed of 
 superhuman powers. The defenders of paganism , at the period 
 of its decline, placed the life and miracles of Apollonius in 
 rivalry with those of Christ; and some moderns have not 
 hesitated to make the same comparison. There is no reason 
 to suppose, however, that Philostratus entertained any idea 
 of this sort in composing his life of Apollonius." — Encl. Brit., 
 Vol. II., p. 189. 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 227 
 
 upon their religion as a fixed dogma. So many Bud- 
 dhists imagine that true Buddhism consists in the 
 teachings of Gautama Buddha, and Christians in the 
 same way trust that the whole breadth and depth 
 of Christianity was developed by Jesus Christ in his 
 sermons, parables, and the example he set in his life. 
 This is not so. Buddha and Christ were the foundersj 
 the one of Buddhism, the other of Christianity. It 
 may be true that the most important features of both 
 religions can be traced to their personal authority, 
 but there are many phases in the development of 
 mankind (so, for instance, the abolition of slavery) 
 which were not thought of at the time either of 
 Buddha or Christ. Neither Buddha nor Christ gave 
 us in their sermons a rule for dealing with the slave 
 problem ; yet we can truly say that their spirit of 
 brotherly love was a most important factor in its 
 final solution. The development of Christianity 
 was not completed with Christ's crucifixion, nor 
 was Buddhism completed at Buddha's death ; both 
 continued to grow and to work out the problems 
 of life in the spirit in which their founders had set 
 the example. They are still growing, and we must 
 be careful not to judge them according to the past 
 alone, but consider the life that is in them now and 
 also their future potentialities. 
 
 Buddhism and Christianity have not only devel- 
 oped the germs which were sown by their founders, 
 but have also assimilated the religious experiences 
 of other nations. _ 
 
 The original Christianity of the church at Jeru- 
 
228 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 salem changed when it spread over the Eoman 
 empire ; and it changed again when introduced 
 among the Teutonic races of the North. Our pres- 
 ent Christianity, for instance, contains more of the 
 Teutonic race ethics than many of us, especially our 
 clergy, are aware of and is very different, indeed, 
 from the original Christianity of the communistic 
 church at Jerusalem. Buddhism, too, has under- 
 gone changes. The Hinayana of southern Buddhism 
 is marked by a certain negativism, while the Maha- 
 yana of northern Buddhism makes the positive aspect 
 of the Dharma and of Nirvana more prominent. 
 Among the Tibetans this tendency of the Mahayana 
 doctrines has developed a fantastic mythology and 
 the ecclesiastical institutions of Lamaism, while the 
 more sober Japanese appear to be quite scholarly 
 and freer from superstition. 
 
 THE SUPERNATURAL IN THE NATURAL. 
 
 Taking it for granted that Buddhism and Chris- 
 tianity have not influenced each other and are of 
 independent growth, their similarities will have to 
 be regarded as the more remarkable, since they will 
 then all the more render a special revelation theory 
 ( redundant. They are a most powerful argument for 
 a sweeping latitudinarianisra, and Avill, if properly 
 understood, crush the last remnant of sectarianism 
 in Christianity. Shall we say that the injunctions : 
 " Recompense injury with goodness," and " hatred 
 does not cease by hatred ; hatred ceases by love," 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 229 
 
 have naturally developed the one in China and the 
 other in India, while the same lofty moral thought 
 could be attained in Judaea only through a superna- 
 tural revelation ? No, the supernatural will develop 
 everywhere according to the eternal laws of nature. 
 
 The sky, in old folk-lore tales, is conceived as a 
 glassy bowl that covers the earth, and the Indians 
 imagine themselves favored by Manitoo, the Great 
 Spirit, who located them under the very top of the 
 heavens. Let us not imitate their narrow-minded- 
 ness by believing that we alone are blessed with the 
 zenith of a religious revelation. God spoke not 
 through Moses alone nor through Jesus alone. God 
 has left no one without a witness, and he speaks to 
 every one of his children in the same way, if they 
 but open their minds to perceive his revelation. The 
 Zenith is over the heads of every one who raises his 
 eyes to look up to it, and there is no part of nature 
 but it contains the supernatural. The natural is 
 supernatural all through. Thus we need not wonder 
 that the foundation-stones of Buddhism and Chris- 
 tianity are the same ; they are of a universal nature. 
 
 We deny the existence of the supernatural in a 
 dualistic sense; but suppose we call such higher 
 features of nature as appear in man's ethical aspira- 
 tions hyperphysical or supernatural because they 
 rise above the lower and purely physical elements of 
 the universe, we must confess that the supernatural 
 lies hidden in the natural and is destined to grow 
 from it according to the cosmic laws of existence. 
 All living creatures face the same universe and are 
 
230 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 confronted with the same problems of life ; must we 
 not, in the end, all come to the same conclusions, 
 and, however different may be the modes of present- 
 ing them, adopt the same rules of conduct ? In the 
 light of a unitary world-conception the agreement 
 between various religions ceases to be startling and 
 finds, even on the assumption that they have devel- 
 oped quite independently, its natural explanation. 
 Yea, we are justified in assuming that if there are 
 beings on other planets, they, too, will develop in 
 the course of their religious evolution a religion of 
 deliverance from evil by the eradication of all self- 
 hood with its vanity, lust and hatred, and by walking 
 in the noble path of righteousness. Among them, 
 too, a saviour will rise to bid them renounce their 
 self and all selfishness, and to take refuge from the 
 evils of existence in an all-embracing love. 
 
 hinIyana, mahayana, mahasetu. 
 
 Recognizing a continued evolution in the religions 
 of mankind, we do not look upon later Buddhism 
 with the same contempt as is customary among 
 many Buddhist scholars. It is true that the old 
 Buddhism of the Hinayana school has preserved the 
 old traditions more faithfully and is more philoso- 
 phical than religious, while the Mahayana school 
 which now obtains in the North, especially in Thibet, 
 in China, and in Japan, is more religious than philo- 
 sophical, almost hiding Buddha's doctrines under 
 an exuberant outgrowth of fantastical superstitions. 
 
HI > 
 
 an unbounded love for all mankind, including one's^t^ 
 enemies. It was quite natural that his followers 
 
 BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 231 
 
 We must, nevertheless, recognize in this progress 
 from the Hinayana, or the small vehicle of salvation, 
 to the Mahayana, or large vehicle of salvation, an 
 advance in the right direction. Buddha had taugh'TI 
 his disciples the path of salvation and had inculcated 
 
 were anxious to extend the blessings of salvation 
 to all mankind. The Hinayana is a religion for theJ 
 thinker, for the wise, for the strong; it is not a 
 gospel to those who are poor in spirit, who are 
 ignorant, who are weak ; and yet it was the prin- 
 ciple of the Master's all-comprehensive compassion 
 to save all the world ! What was more natural to a 
 true-hearted Buddhist than to make the blessing of 
 Buddha's religion accessible to the multitudes ? The 
 small canoe of the Hinayana sufficed for every one 
 only to save himself and no one else. But what did a 
 Buddhist care for his own salvation? A true Budd- 
 hist had ceased to be troubled about himself. He 
 wanted to save others. Thus the general idea of 
 a Mahayana, a large conveyance of salvation, of a 
 great ship to cross the stream of worldliness, of 
 sin, and suffering, was a logical consequence of 
 Buddha's doctrine, even though the methods with 
 which this idea was realized may in many respects be 
 regarded as a failure. Yet in judging the Mahayana 
 system and its fantastical offshoots, we must con- 
 sider the mental state of those nations for whom it 
 was adapted, and it may be that a purer religion 
 would have failed utterly where cruder allegories of 
 
232 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 what appears to us as childish superstitions exercised 
 a beneficent influence. The Mah^yana has changed 
 the savage hordes of central Asia, from whom pro- 
 ceeded the most barbarous invaders, dreaded by all 
 their neighbors, into a most kind-hearted people, with 
 a sacred passion for universal benevolence and 
 charity. 
 
 Considering the development from a Hinayana 
 conception to a Mah^^yana practice as an advance, 
 we can still less regard Christianity, even if its deri- 
 vation from Buddhism were certain, as a deteriora- 
 
 j tion. Buddhism, viz., the original Buddhism of 
 Buddha, is more philosophical and more abstract 
 than Christianity, but Christianity is more religious. 
 Buddhism, viz., again, the original Buddhism of 
 Buddha, is free from all mythological elements while 
 Christianity employs a number of allegorical ex- 
 pressions which are both appropriate and forcible. 
 There is the dogma of the personality of God, of the 
 Sonship of Christ of the quickening influence of the 
 Holy Ghost, of the personality of Satan, of angels 
 and devils, of heaven and hell ; and even to-day the 
 belief in the literal meaning of all these religious 
 symbols is counted among many Christians as the 
 
 ^est of orthodoxy. A belief in the letter replaces 
 the belief in the spirit. But what does it matter that 
 during the development of the Church the letter of 
 symbolically expressed truth, has crystallized into 
 temporarily fixed dogmas, which sometimes threat- 
 ened to ossify the properly religious spirit of Chris- 
 tianity ? The symbolism of Christianity is after all 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 233 
 
 its dross only ; its essence is that ethical spirit whic^ 
 it has in common with Buddhism. The Christian 
 dogmatology, if properly recognized in its symbolical 
 nature, is most beautiful, expressive, and true, but 
 if taken in its literal meaning commits us to irra- 
 tional absurdities. He who believes in the letter of 
 a myth, or a dogma, or a religious allegory, is a pagan, 
 and Christian paganism is not less absurd than 
 Lamaistic or any other paganism. JS'evertheless, he 
 who believes in a myth that contains in the garb of 
 a parable a religious truth, and accordingly regulates 
 his moral conduct, is better off than he who is void of 
 any faith. The truth hidden in the myth teaches him 
 and serves him as a guide ; it comforts him in affliction, 
 strengthens him in temptation, and shows him in an al- 
 legorical reflexion the bliss that rests upon righteous- 
 ness. The Hinayana, in its abstractness, it appears to 
 us, is indeed insufficient for the masses of mankind, and 
 had to change into a Mahayana system before it could 
 conquer almost half the world. Christianity, how- 
 ever, is more perfect even than the Mahayana of Bud- 
 dhism, as a vehicle of salvation for the masses of man- 
 kind. While the schools of Buddhism may be com- 
 pared to ships that cross the stream, Christianity is 
 like a large and solid bridge. Christianity is a Mah^- 
 setu. A child may walk over in perfect safety. 
 Christianity is, as St. Augustine says, like a water in 
 which a lamb can wade while an elephant must swim. 
 It is difficult to explain spiritual truths to an un- 
 trained mind, for even philosophers find it difficult to 
 understand why we must free our souls from the 
 
234 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 thought of self and overcome all vanity, lust, hatred, 
 and ill will. But a young Christian heart finds it very 
 natural. Without going through all the painful ex- 
 periences which lead to the abandonment of selfish- 
 ness, a Christian child having received Jesus and his 
 all-comprehensive love into his heart is, on the start 
 of his life, placed in the right moral attitude towards 
 the world. Christianity (and this is both its strength 
 and its weakness) has been especially successful 
 in teaching surrender of self without at the same 
 time disturbing the egotism so strongly developed 
 in the Western nations. Thus Christianity ex- 
 tends religious bliss not only to the ignorant who 
 do not understand the problem of life of which 
 Christian ethics present a practical solution, but also 
 to those whose eyes remain still covered with the 
 veil of selfhood ; yea, even to the little children who 
 have never as yet heard of sin or the cause of sin. 
 There is no more characteristic saying of Christ's 
 than his words : " Suffer little children to come unto 
 me." 
 
 1^0 fault can be found either with Christianity or 
 the symbols of Christianity, but blame rests with 
 those who claim that the Christian symbols do not 
 merely contain the truth in the language of parables, 
 but that they are the truth itself, the absolute truth 
 which must be accepted in blind faith whatever be 
 the verdict of a rational inquiry or scientific criticism. 
 The Christian whose faith consists in obedience to 
 the spirit of Christ's ethics can shake hands with the 
 Buddhist and say, we are brethren ; our religions 
 
BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY. 235 
 
 solve the problems of life in a similar spirit, although 
 we differ in our modes of expression. The Christian, 
 however, whose faith is a belief in the letter of his 
 dogmas will regard the Buddhist, be he ever so 
 highly educated, as a pagan and Buddha as a false 
 prophet or even " an impostor." * The latter kind 
 of Christianity is still regarded as orthodox, but 
 the time will come and is near at hand when its 
 flagrant paganism will be recognized by the very 
 authorities of the Church. The former kind of 
 Christianity will be established as the only true 
 Christianity, and the old narrow orthodoxy of bigotry 
 and blind faith will be supplanted by the new broad 
 orthodoxy of scientific truth. 
 
 Christianity, at present the second largest religion 
 in the world, can very well become the universal re- 
 ligion of mankind, but there is one condition which 
 must be fulfilled before it can gain the victory. It 
 must discard all paganism ; it must become conscious 
 of the symbolical element of its symbols ; it must 
 with impartial justice recognize the truth wherever 
 it be ; it must be courageous enough to acknowledge 
 its own errors of former misinterpretations, and ap- 
 preciate the good that is contained in other religions ; 
 in a word, it must become a cosmic religion — truly 
 catholic and orthodox. 
 
 What is more orthodox than that which with 
 methodical exactness has been proved to be true, 
 and what is more catholic than science ? We must 
 
 * See Spence Hardy in his Legends and Theories of the Bud- 
 dhists, p. 207. 
 
236 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 learn to understand that science is a religious rev- 
 elation. 
 
 This, in essence, is the lesson which a comparison 
 of Buddhism with Christianity can teach us : Above 
 any Hinayana, Mahayana and Mahasetu is the Re- 
 ligion of Truth, and the truth reveals itself every- 
 where, to every one who has the religious spirit to 
 seek it, and dares to find it. 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 
 
 THE MISSIONARY PROBLEM. 
 
 Missions are highly recommendable. They are in 
 themselves a good thing and ought to be continued 
 with vigor and enthusiasm. That religion is dead 
 which does not missionarize. Ko Avorse objection 
 can be made to the free-thinkers of to-day, who fre- 
 quently boast of representing the world-conception 
 of the cultured and the intelligent, than their utter 
 want of the missionarizing spirit. Free thought 
 can become worthy of consideration only when it 
 begins to missionarize. So long as free-thinkers do 
 not bring sacrifices for a wide propagation of their 
 views their faith is plainly of a negative kind. A 
 positive faith always engenders an enthusiasm to 
 spread it. Missionarizing, far from being " iJl-judged 
 and unreasonable " is a sure symptom of the life that 
 is in a religion. But while missions ought to be en- 
 couraged, we ought to spread at the same time the 
 right spirit of missionarizing. 
 
 The missionary who wants to spread his faith 
 must not revile the people whom he wants to con- 
 vert. He must not distort nor misrepresent their 
 religious views, and not unnecessarily desecrate 
 
 237 
 
238 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 what is sacred to them. There are Christians among 
 whom the opinion prevails that the good qualities 
 of pagan religions are an obstacle to Christianity. 
 Whenever such views obtain it is a sure sign that 
 the right missionary spirit is missing. Let a mis- 
 sionary always look for the good sides of other re- 
 ligions, and let him carefully search for all the points 
 of contact. Only by utilizing the good in paganism, 
 only by gaining the sympathy of the pagans, can 
 Christianity hope to conquer. 
 
 "When St. Paul came to Athens he did not revile 
 the Greek gods. On the contrary, he looked for 
 some point of contact, and found it at last in an in- 
 scription written upon the altar dedicated to the 
 Unknown God. Praising the scrupulous and con- 
 scientious religiosity of the Athenians, he proceeded 
 to preach to them the Unknown God whom they 
 had unwittingly worshipped. 
 
 There is a papal brief still extant written by Greg- 
 ory the Great, in the year 601, and addressed to the 
 missionary monk Augustine, in which the policy of 
 a very ingenious method of missionarizing is out- 
 lined. The Pope was apparently a practical psy- 
 chologist who knew how to treat men and make 
 innovations acceptable. Whatever criticism may be 
 made on the Pope's advice as being a kind of com- 
 promise with paganism, it certainly shows great 
 keenness and good judgment. The success of his 
 missionaries in England was a good evidence of the 
 cleverness of his methods. Churches were built right 
 on the shrines and sanctuaries of the old gods, and 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 239 
 
 the pagan festivals were continued under Christian 
 names. Pope Gregory says : 
 
 " Because they (the Anglo-Saxons) are wont to slaughter 
 at the feasts of the devils (i. e., of the pagan gods) many- 
 oxen and horses, it is decidedly necessary to let these feasts 
 be continued and have another raison d'etre given them. On 
 kirmess and on the commemoration days of the holy martyrs, 
 whose relics are preserved in those churches which are built 
 on the spots of pagan fanes, a similar feast shall be cele- 
 brated ; the festive place shall be decorated with green 
 boughs and a church sociable shall be held. Only the slaugh- 
 ter of animals shall no longer be held in honor of Satan, but 
 in praise of God, and the animals shall be slaughtered for the 
 sake of eating them, and thanks shall be given for the gift to 
 the Giver of all goods." * 
 
 Gregory advises not to destroy the pagan temples, 
 but to transform them into churches. He urges the 
 adoption, as much as possible, of pagan rites, and 
 the substitution of the names of saints for the names 
 of heroes and gods. In the same spirit Bishop 
 Daniel writes to Winfrid, commonly called Boniface 
 (Epist. xiv., 99), to be tolerant, patient, and to avoid 
 all objurgation lest the pagans be embittered. " A 
 missionary should not at once repudiate the gene- 
 alogies of the gods, but should rather use them to 
 prove their human character. He should propose 
 questions which would set the pagans to thinking 
 about the origin of the world and the origin of the 
 gods, whence the gods came and what be the origin 
 of the first god, whether they continue to generate 
 
 *See Beda Venerabilis, Hist. Edcles. Britorum, I., Chap. 30. 
 
240 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 new gods, and, if not, when they had discontinued 
 increasing, and, if they continued increasing, whether 
 their number would by-and-by be infinite." 
 
 Leo the Great utilized the pagan art of Rome for 
 Christian art. He changed the statue of Jupiter 
 into St. Peter, and the goddess Anna Perenna be- 
 came St. Anna Petronela, who is still worshipped in 
 the Campagna. And the Christian missionaries 
 imitated the Pope's method. The Teutonic eschat- 
 ology of Muspilli, which is the destruction of the 
 world b}^ fire, was Christianized by German converts 
 in a poem where Elijah and other saints and arch- 
 angels take the place of the Teutonic gods, whose 
 original features are unmistakably preserved. 
 
 This method of missionarizing had its serious 
 drawbacks, and led for a time to a great confusion 
 of Christian and pagan beliefs. Thus the Danish 
 king, Suen Tuesking, when starting on an expedition 
 to England, made a treble vow to the god Bragafull, 
 to Christ, and to St. Michael. And Ave read of 
 Ketil, an Irish warrior, who in all ordinary cases 
 called upon Christ, but whenever there was a matter 
 of grave importance he addressed himself to Thor.* 
 It is true that many pagan institutions and customs 
 survived, but after all in the long run the evil influ- 
 ences were overcome, and the good only remained. 
 A pagan festival, the Yuletide, has now become the 
 most celebrated Christian feast, bearing the name 
 Christmas, and Christianity was not the loser by it. 
 
 I do not mean to say that Christian missionaries 
 
 *Roskoff, Geschichte des Teufels.Yol. II., pp. 10-13. 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 241 
 
 should temporize with heathen error or compromise 
 with heathen institutions ; not at all ; I only mean 
 to say that Christian missionaries should not imitate 
 St. Augustine's maxim, who regarded all virtues of 
 the pagans as shining vices, but that they should 
 joyously recognize and hail everything good in 
 pagan religions. I simply stand up for rigid justice, 
 and would demand of every missionary a sympa- 
 thetic comprehension of that religion which the 
 people to whom he is sent have embraced. 
 
 Are there not many institutions, moral convictions, 
 habits and modes of thought in pagan countries 
 which are unnecessarily antagonized by our mission- 
 aries ? Should not Christian missionaries, in order 
 to be successful, first of all have regard for the 
 religious views which they intend to overthrow ? 
 Should they not recognize the noble aspirations of 
 pagan saints and prophets, such as Buddha and 
 Confucius ? It would be better for Christianity if 
 the pagan nations themselves began to send mis- 
 sionaries to Christian countries. For there is 
 nothing more spiritually healthful than a severe 
 competition among those who cherish the confidence 
 of having found the truth. 
 
 We regret to say that the spirit in which the mis- 
 sionary addresses unbelievers is, upon the whole, 
 offensive. He comes to non-Christians like an 
 enemy who wants to destroy that which they regard 
 as the highest and best, and the result is that they 
 only gain converts of the lowest type, who become 
 converted solely for the sake of worldly advantages 
 i6 
 
242 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 and are a disgrace to the religion to which they be- 
 come affiliated. 
 
 The proper spirit for a missionary would be to 
 go to unbelievers, to reside among them in their own 
 style of living and give them a practical example of 
 his views of life. He should go to other countries 
 and inquire into the significance of the people's reli- 
 gious convictions. He should say to them, " The 
 people of our country are interested in your welfare 
 and in your conceptions of truth. Please let me 
 know what you believe, and when you have told me 
 what you believe I will, if you are willing to listen 
 to me, tell you what we believe. We believe that 
 we are right and you believe that you are right. Let 
 us compare our views, and whatever I can learn from 
 you I wish to learn, and, mce versa, I expect that 
 whatever you can learn from me you will consider, 
 and, whatever the truth may be, we shall both be 
 glad to accept it." If missionaries come in this 
 spirit to other countries Christianity will no longer 
 be identified with beef eating in China and with 
 liquor drinking in India. There would be no prose- 
 cution. Missionaries could without fear of danger 
 enter into the remotest corners of China. They 
 would not be hated, but would be welcomed, and we 
 hope that a time will come when all religions will 
 exchange missionaries in the same way that the gov- 
 ernment of our nation sends ambassadors to other 
 nations and in turn receives their representatives. 
 
 The reason why the Christian missions of the 
 present day are, upon the whole, a lamentable fail- 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 243 
 
 ure, is due mainly to the haughtiness with which 
 Christ's religion is offered to the pagans. Christians 
 are so deeply impressed with Christ's humility that 
 they are not aware of the pride which they them- 
 selves exhibit. There is, for instance, a missionary 
 hymn whose melodious rhymes are frequently heard 
 in Christian churches. The verses are beautiful, 
 but they are marred by an undisguised contempt 
 for the heathen ; yet no missionary seems aware of 
 it. The first stanza is grand and full of inspiration ; 
 it reads : 
 
 " From Greenland's icy mountains, 
 
 From India's coral strand, 
 Where Af ric's sunny fountains 
 
 Roll down their golden sand ; 
 From many an ancient river, 
 
 From many a palmy plain, 
 They call us to deliver 
 
 Their land from error's chain." 
 
 That is genuine poetry, and how praiseworthy in 
 spirit ! But the poet continues : 
 
 '* What though the spicy breezes 
 
 Blow soft o'er Ceylon's isle, 
 Though every prospect pleases, 
 
 And only man is vile ; 
 In vain with lavish kindness 
 
 The gifts of God are strown. 
 The heathen in his blindness 
 
 Bows down to wood and stone." 
 
 The Singhalese people are neither vile nor idola- 
 trous ; they are famed as the gentlest race on earth, 
 and their religion is Buddhism. Their worship con- 
 
244 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 sists in flower offerings at Buddha-shrines, but even 
 the most ignorant of them are aware of the fact 
 that a Buddha statue is not the Buddha himself. 
 Protestants make similar accusations against the 
 Roman Catholics, when they ought to distinguish 
 between practices resembling idolatry and idolatry 
 itself. 
 
 If Buddhists sent missionaries to our country who 
 sang such stanzas to us, how should we like it ? It 
 is certain that missionary hymns which denounce 
 the people of Ceylon as " vile " do not help Chris- 
 tians to make converts among them. 
 
 The hymn continues : 
 
 ** Can we, whose souls are lighted 
 With wisdom from on high, 
 Can we to men benighted 
 The lamp of life deny ? " 
 
 The poet intends to glorify " the light from on 
 high," but he exalts himself as belonging to those 
 " whose souls are enlightened with wisdom from on 
 high " — which makes a great difference ! His noble 
 zeal for spreading the truth appears as pharisaical 
 self-conceit, and can only give offence to those whom 
 he wishes to convert. Thus it is natural that when 
 Christian missionaries speak of love, Buddhists ac- 
 cuse them of haughtiness and pride. 
 
 Missionaries do not only unnecessarily offend the 
 pagans by showing a contempt for their persons, 
 their religion, their morals and their nationality, 
 but also require of their converts a surrender of 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 245 
 
 habits and customs which they cannot give up 
 without cutting themselves loose from their tradi- 
 tions, which necessarily and naturally have become 
 most sacred to them. It should be as little neces- 
 sary for a Chinaman to sever himself from the noble 
 traditions of his nation if he becomes a Christian, as 
 it would be for a Jew to look upon his race as the 
 outcasts of God. Jew-Christians might continue to 
 abstain from pork, and Buddhist vegetarians who 
 become Christians might remain vegetarians after 
 their conversion. 
 
 in the Kussian Church it is customary for con- 
 verts to curse the faith to which they formerly be- 
 longed, and we are informed that the present 
 Empress was the first instance in which an excep- 
 tion of this un-Christian ordinance had been made. 
 She was permitted to become a Greek Catholic 
 without cursing the Lutheran denomination, in 
 which she was reared. 
 
 There are customs in China expressive of the 
 sacredness of family traditions which a convert is 
 expected to renounce on account of the religious 
 character of family reunions. 
 
 In a book on China entitled The Dragon^ Image 
 (md Demon, by the Eev. Hampten C. Du Bose, 
 which contains much valuable information, but is 
 written in a spirit that does not become a Christian 
 missionary, we find the following statement on An- 
 cestral Halls in China. The Kev. Mr. Du Bose says : 
 
 " These buildings are not so conspicuous as the idol temples, 
 but they are very numerous, as any family or clan may have its 
 
246 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 temple, generally marked by the funereal cedar. Here the 
 * spirit tablets ' of departed forefathers are kept, * containing 
 the simple legend of the two ancestral names carved on a 
 board,' and ' to the child the family tablet is a reality, the 
 abode of a personal being who exerts an influence over him 
 that cannot be evaded, and is far more to him as an individual 
 than any of the popular gods. The gods are to be feared and 
 their wrath deprecated, but ancestors represent love, care, and 
 kindly interest.' If the clan do not own an ancestral hall, 
 there is * in every household a shrine, a tablet, an oratory or 
 a domestic temple, according to the position of the family. 
 It is a grand and solemn occasion when all the males of a tribe 
 in their dress robes gather at the temple, perhaps a great 
 ' country seat,' of the dead, and the patriarch of the line, as a 
 chief priest of the family, offers sacrifice. 
 
 " Much property is entailed upon these ancestral halls to 
 keep up the worship, but as this expense is not great, all the 
 family have shares in the joint capital, and the head of the 
 clan sometimes comes in for a good living. At baptism con- 
 verts to the Christian faith renounce their claim to a share in 
 this family estate because of its idolatrous connections. 
 
 " In these halls the genealogical tables are kept, and many 
 of the Chinese can trace their ancestry to ten, twenty, thirty, 
 and sometimes even to sixty generations. These registers are 
 kept with great care, and may be considered reliable. 
 
 *' ' Should a man become a Christian and repudiate ancestral 
 worship, all his ancestors would by that act be consigned to a 
 state of perpetual beggary. Imagine, too, the moral courage 
 required for an only or the eldest son to become a Christian, 
 and call down upon himself the anathemas not only of his 
 own family and friends, but of the spirits of all his ancestors. 
 
 *' When we preach against this form of paganism it seems 
 as heathenish to the Chinese, as if at home we taught a child^ 
 to disobey his father and despise his mother. ' It forms one 
 of the subtlest phases of idolatry— essentially evil with the 
 guise of goodness — ever established among men.' " 
 
 Du Bose is well-meaning, but a partisan ; he is 
 a Christian pagan, who believes that the institutions 
 
CHRISTIAN CKITICS OF BUDDHISM. 247 
 
 of his sect and nation alone afford salvation. His 
 book is an instance»of the wrong spirit that prevails 
 among many Christian missionaries. It is not free 
 from misrepresentations, but lacks all consideration 
 of, and reverence for the accomplishments of great 
 men that are of another creed and another race. Of 
 the founder of Tauism, Du Bose says, p. 345 : 
 
 " His name * [sic] is Laotsze, which means literally ' old 
 boy,' or, judging from some things that are said about him, 
 the wild Western appellation * old coon ' is not inappropriate." 
 
 Du Bose calls Buddha " the Night of Asia," as if 
 Asia Avould have been better off without Buddhism. 
 As for Buddhistic superstitions, which every Bud- 
 dhist will grant prevail among the uneducated classes, 
 we w^ould say that Buddha can be made as little 
 responsible for them as Christ is responsible for 
 Christian crusades, witch prosecutions, and heresy 
 trials, which were once quite common over all 
 Christendom. 
 
 Christian missionaries ought to be bent on pre- 
 serving all that is good in the Chinese character. 
 They must not ruthlessly break down those features 
 which are characteristic of the Chinese. If mission- 
 aries cannot find a modus vivendi for converts by 
 which they can preserve their hallowed family rela- 
 tions and continue to hold their ancestors dear, we 
 cannot blame the Chinese Government for regarding 
 
 * Lautsze, which means " the old philosopher," is not a name, 
 but an appellation. His proper name is Er, his family name 
 Li. Tsze means child and philosopher at the same time. 
 
248 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Christian missionaries as a public nuisance. We 
 respect the Saxon chief who, on hearing that all his 
 ancestors were in Hell, withdrew from the baptismal 
 font and preferred eternal damnation with his fathers 
 to the bliss of the Christian Heaven in the company 
 of Christian monks. 
 
 Missionarizing should not cease, but should be 
 raised to a higher level. It should be done in broth- 
 erly love, not with contempt or in a spirit of pharisaic 
 self-conceit. The rules which ought to be observed 
 by all of us are well set forth by the Kev. George 
 T. Candlin, of Tien-tsin, a Christian missionary to 
 China, who personally and in friendliness met the 
 Buddhist and Confucian delegates from Eastern Asia 
 on the platform of the Keligious Parliament. He 
 writes : 
 
 " We must begin by giving one another credit for good in- 
 tentions. I do not see why we may not commence at once by 
 the leading representatives of the various faiths who were 
 present at Chicago, including all the distinguished represen- 
 tatives of Christianity, with Mr. Mozoomdar, Mr. Dharmapala, 
 Mr. Vivekananda. Mr. Ghandi, the Buddhists of Japan, the 
 high priest of Shintoism, and our friend Mr. Pung entering 
 into direct covenant with each other : 
 
 " 1. Personally never to speak slightingly of the religious 
 faith of one another. This I understand does not debar the 
 kindly and reverential discussion of differences which exist, 
 or the frank utterance of individual belief. 
 
 " 2. Officially to promote among their partisans, by all 
 means in their power, by oral teaching, through tlie press, and 
 by whatever opportunity God may give them, a like spirit of 
 brotherly regard and honest respect for the beliefs of others. 
 
 "3. To discourage amongst the various peoples they serve as 
 religious guides, all such practices and ceremonies as not 
 
CHKISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 249 
 
 constituting an essential part of their faith, are inimical to its 
 purity and are the strongest barriers to union. 
 
 "4. To promote all such measures as will advance reform, 
 progress and enlightenment, political liberty and social im- 
 provement among the people of their own faith and nation- 
 ality. 
 
 " 5. To regard it as part of their holiest work on earth to 
 enlist all men of ability and influence with whom they are 
 brought into contact in the same noble cause. 
 
 " To these articles I can heartily subscribe myself. I do not 
 see why others may not." 
 
 A BUDDHIST TRACT. 
 
 During the World's Fair the interest taken in 
 other religions, especially in Buddhism, grew to 
 such an extraordinary degree that some Christians 
 began to fear for Christianity and tried to counter- 
 act the favorable impression which the foreign 
 delegates had made on the Chicago public. The 
 idea prevailed that missionary work was redundant 
 because the followers of Buddha, Zoroaster, Mo- 
 hammed, and Confucius were on a par with the 
 followers of Jesus Christ, and no longer needed the 
 Gospel. To counteract the evil influence of this 
 opinion, a leaflet was published for distribution at the 
 entrance of the Art Palace, in which the Eeligious 
 Parliament was being held. The leaflet fell into my 
 hands, and, being of extraordinary interest, I can- 
 not help calling attention to it, and shall be glad to 
 contribute my share to its wide circulation.* 
 
 *Tlie leaflets can be had at five cents each, ten for 25 cents, 
 or $1.50 per hundred, from W. E. B., 332 Lake street, Oak 
 Park, Illinois. 
 
250 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 The leaflet contains the reprint of a Chinese plac- 
 ard, being a religious tract that exhorts men to con- 
 version. The occasion on which the placard was 
 produced is described in The Far East^ as follows : 
 
 " Gan-kin was full of death. There was a great drought. 
 No rain had fallen for six months. The city was parched and 
 dry. Foul odors and pestilential gases, resulting from inde- 
 scribably unsanitary conditions, bred fevers and cholera and 
 death. There was no water to wash in, and hardly any to 
 drink. The children died. The beasts died. The people died. 
 The crops failed. Famine threatened the city. Who was to 
 blame? Above all, who was to help? 
 
 " Kaolaishan, disciple of Buddha, had an inspiration. The 
 Buddhist priest Che had spoken. Gan-kin had forgotten his 
 words ; this miserable state of things was quite to be expected ; 
 but the town should remember once more. If he were to re- 
 mind Gan-kin, it would be an act of merit. He would gain. 
 The town would gain. He might avert the famine. 
 
 ** And so it came to pass that the words of the Buddhist 
 priest Che were once more in vogue at Gan-kin. Kaolaishan 
 did his work thoroughly. He printed a large tract. It was 
 three feet long and one and one-half feet wide. It w^as posted 
 up on the walls and distributed by thousands. Everybody 
 who could read, read it. Everybody who could pray, prayed 
 it. It enjoined a constant repetition of Buddha's name. His 
 name was repeated innumerable times, for could not his name 
 avail to avert the famine ? 
 
 " The central figure on the sheet was that of the Buddhist 
 priest. The lines of his garments were ingeniously contrived 
 in readable characters. Three rows of dots on his shaven head 
 showed the marks of his ordination. For every bead on the 
 rosary in his hand he was supposed to repeat Buddha's name 
 or a prayer. A cofiin and a skeleton at the foot of the sheet 
 represented death— a subject on which the Buddhist priest had 
 thought." 
 
 The leaflet reproduces in fac-simile on a reduced 
 
CHRISTIAN CKITICS OF BUDDHISM. 251 
 
 scale the Chinese placard, and offers a literal transla- 
 tion of its contents, neglecting, however, the poetic 
 measure and the rhyme, and showing sometimes a 
 lack of tact in the choice of words. But the transla- 
 tion is clear enough to render the sense and give a 
 fair impression of the religious spirit of the original. 
 The motive of the publication is " to let Buddhism 
 speak for itself." The author of the tract says : 
 
 *' Buddhism is the faith of millions to-day. Are we to be- 
 lieve that this faith, evolved by the ages in the process of re- 
 ligious development, exactly suits the requirements of these 
 millions, and that all efforts for their evangelization are ill- 
 judged and unreasonable attempts to foist a foreign faith 
 upon people who do not need it any more than they need 
 foreign clothes ? Or are we to number them among ' the 
 ignorant and those that are out of the way,' upon whom the 
 Christ of God had compassion, whom He has died to redeem, 
 and to whom we are responsible to carry the glad tidings of 
 His great love and great salvation ? " 
 
 Before entering into the contents of the Buddhist 
 tract I wish to repeat that, far from being opposed to 
 missions, I am a strong supporter of the missionary 
 spirit and, lest the following criticisms be misunder- 
 stood, the reader should bear in mind what has been 
 said in the beginning of this chapter on the mis- 
 sionary problem. 
 
 The little Buddhist tract, translated for the pur- 
 pose of ridiculing Buddhism, is apparently a gem 
 of religious poetry, and many passages of it might 
 grace any Christian hymn-book if the translation 
 were only cast into an elegant literary form. 
 
252 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 The title of the whole reads : " Tract Exhorting 
 All Men to Invoke Buddha's JS'ame." It consists of 
 several parts. The first of it is a religious hymn on 
 the vanity of all things, composed by the Buddhist 
 priest Che, and reads, according to the translation 
 before me, as follows : 
 
 " It is good to reform ; it is good to reform, 
 The things of the world will be all swept away. 
 Let others be busy while buried in care, 
 My mind, all un vexed, shall be pure. 
 
 " They covet all day long, and when are they satisfied? 
 They only regret that the wealth of the family is small. 
 They are clearly but puppets held up by a string. 
 When the string breaks they come down with a run. 
 
 *' In the domain of death there is neither great nor small. 
 They use not gold nor silver and need not precious things, 
 There is no distinction made between mean and ignoble, 
 ruler and prince. 
 
 " Every year many are buried beneath the fragrant grass ; 
 Look at the red sun setting behind the western hills. 
 Before you are aware the cock crows and it is daylight again. 
 
 *' Speedily reform. Do not say : * It is early,' 
 The smallest child easily becomes old. 
 Your talent reaches to the dipper (in the heavens). 
 Your wealth fills a thousands chests. 
 
 [But consider that] the consequences of your actions will 
 follow you in future time.* 
 
 * This line deviates from the copy before me. The translator 
 has somehow misunderstood the original Chinese, and trans- 
 lates ** your patrimony follows you, when will you be satis- 
 fied ? The rendering as given above is on the authority of 
 Mr. K. Tanaka, a Japanese student of philosophy at the Uni- 
 versity of Chicago, whom I requested to revise the question- 
 able passages of the translation. 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BCJDDHISM. 263 
 
 ** It is good to exhort people to reform. 
 To become vegetarian,* and invoke Buddha's name is a pre- 
 cious thing you can carry with you. 
 It may be seen that wealth and reputation are vain. 
 You cannot do better than to invoke Buddha's name. 
 
 " There is, there is ; there is not, there is not ; yet we are 
 
 troubled. 
 We labor, we toil ; when do we rest ? 
 Man born is like a winding stream ; 
 The affairs of the world are heaped up mountain high. 
 From of old, from of old, and now, and now, many return 
 
 to their original. 
 The poor, the poor, the rich, the rich, change places. 
 We pass the time as a matter of course ; 
 The bitter, the bitter, the sweet, the sweet, their destiny is 
 
 the same." 
 
 » * 
 
 " To covet profit and seek reputation the world over 
 Is not so good as (to wear) a ragged priest's garment, and be 
 
 found among the Buddhists. 
 A caged fowl has food, but the gravy pot is near. 
 The wild crane has no grain, but heaven and earth are his.f 
 
 " It is difficult to retain wealth and fame for a hundred years. 
 Transmigration of souls continually causes change. 
 I exhort you, gentlemen, to speedily seek some way of re- 
 forming your conduct. 
 A man (being) once lost, a million ages (of suffering) will be 
 hard to bear. " 
 
 * 
 * # 
 
 " A solitary lamp illumines the darkness of the night. 
 You get into bed, take off your socks and shoes ; 
 
 * The Chinese, speaking generally, are, as a nation, vegeta- 
 rians. Frequently this is a matter of necessity with them, but 
 when strict Buddhists they abstain from animal food from re- 
 ligious motives.— Foot-note of the Missionary Tract. 
 
 f The crane denotes the Buddhist work. 
 
254 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Your three souls and seven spirits turn and follow your 
 dreams,* 
 
 Whether they will come back in the morning light is un- 
 certain." 
 
 * 
 * * 
 
 ** To be forgotten, grow old, and die of disease is a bitter thing, 
 But who has not this ? 
 
 If you do not invoke Amitabha Buddha, how can you escape 
 punishment." 
 
 " Villainous devices, treacherous evil, hidden poison, false 
 
 rejoicing, 
 Forgetting favors, crossing the river and then breaking the 
 
 bridge (i. e. , to serve oneself at the expense of others). 
 Losing all conscience, deceiving one's own heart ; one that 
 
 has done these things will live with the king of Hell. 
 He that has said good-bye to conscience, finds it even now 
 
 difficult 
 To escape the punishment of the knife-hill and oil pot. 
 Houses, gold and silver, land, wife, family, 
 Grace and love, rank and lust, all are VAIN." f 
 
 [Now the Buddhist priest addresses the skeleton : — ] 
 *' How can you, sir, carry all things away with you ? 
 A few layers of yellow earth cover all your glory." 
 
 * The three souls are three abstracts of man's psychic life, 
 such as we make when distinguishing between mind, soul and 
 spirit. The seven elementary spirits represent various aspects 
 of man's vitality and the physiological processes of his system. 
 
 f The characters representing these several possessions are 
 ranged above one large, elongated sign. This character, which 
 is pronounced Kong, and corresponds pretty accurately to the 
 Latin vanus, is thus shown to be the sum of man's earthly 
 possessions and attainments ; reminding one strongly of the 
 words of the preacher — " All is vanity." — Remark of the Mis- 
 sionary translator. 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS AND BUDDHISM. 255 
 
 [The inscription on the coffin reads as follows : — ] 
 A silver coffin worth 108,000 ounces of pure silver (about 
 
 £27,000). 
 This man took pains to devise ingenious things, but all in 
 
 VAIN. 
 
 To travel east, west, north, south, to see all life is vain ; 
 
 Heaven is vain, earth is vain, including also mysterious man. 
 
 The sun is vain, the moon is vain. 
 
 They come and go, for what purpose ? 
 
 Fields are vain, lands are vain, how quickly they change 
 
 owners I 
 Gold is vain, silver is vain, after death how much remains 
 
 in your hand ? 
 Wives are vain, children are vain. 
 They do not join you on the way to hades. 
 According to the ' Tatsang classic ' vanity is lust, 
 According to ' Panrohsin classic ' lust is vanity. 
 He that travels from east to west is like a bonny bee ; 
 After he has made honey from flowers with all his labor, all 
 
 is vain. 
 
 After midnight you hear the drum beat the third watch, 
 You turn over, and before you know where you are you hear 
 
 the bell striking the fifth watch [indicating daylight] . 
 To carefully think it over from the start, it is like a dream. 
 If you do not believe, look at the peach and apricot trees, 
 How long after the flowers open are they withered I 
 If you regard prince and minister, after death they revert to 
 
 the soil. 
 Their bodies go to the earth, their breath to the winds, 
 Within the covering of yellow earth there is nothing but a 
 
 mass of corruption ; they pass away no better than pigs 
 
 or dogs. 
 Why did they not at the beginning inquire of the Buddhist 
 
 priest Che ? 
 There is one life and not two deaths ; 
 Don't brag, then, before others of your cleverness. 
 
256 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 A man during life owns vast tracts of land. 
 After death he can only have three paces of earth [eight 
 feet of land by twelve in length].* 
 
 Here we must interrupt our quotation because the 
 next following lines are apparently misunderstood 
 by the translator. As they stand they give no 
 sense. The translation reads as follows : 
 
 " To think it over carefully after death, nothing would be 
 taken away ; 
 The Buddhist priest Che has, with his own hand, written to 
 you. 
 The word heart : loudly laugh ! 
 
 ** Not much time need be employed in writing it. 
 It has one curve like the moon and three dots all awry. 
 The feathered tribe, and the beasts also, will become Buddhas. 
 If you only invoke Buddha's name you will go to the king- 
 dom where there is the highest bliss." 
 
 The translator adds the following comment in 
 explanation : 
 
 [At this point it will be seen that the winding convolutions 
 of the priest's robe have reached the centre of his body. Here 
 the heart is by the Chinese supposed to be located, and a good 
 deal of the " ingenuity " referred to in the title is contained in 
 the fact that at this point the characters refer to the heart. 
 Hence the exhortation to *' laugh loudly." To Western minds 
 the sudden introduction of three wholly disconnected lines 
 breaking in upon the theme of the discourse is not sufficiently 
 ingenious to dispense with explanation.] 
 
 The original Chinese, which in this passage, in 
 spite of its reduction in size, is plainly legible, means 
 (according to Mr. Tanaka's version) : 
 
 * Mr. Tanaka calls my attention to the fact that the translator 
 omitted this line but quoted it in a foot-note as the literal 
 translation of " three paces of earth." 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS AND BTTDDHISM. 257 
 
 The Buddhist priest Che wrote with his hand the word 
 " heart," and he laughed to himself [thinking] how little time 
 is needed in writing it, etc. 
 
 That is to say : The Buddhist priest Che writes 
 the character hsin,^ which in Chinese is one of the 
 easiest words to write, and he thinks to himself, "If 
 only the people knew how easy it is to attain salva- 
 tion ! It is as easy as the writing of the word heart. 
 Thus the whole world can be transfigured into the 
 state of JSTirvana if only the name of Buddha be 
 rightly invoked." 
 
 The passage reminds one of an old German hymn, 
 which begins : 
 
 *' Es ist gar leicht ein Christ zu sein /" 
 " Tis easy indeed to be a Christian." 
 
 "We need not discuss the significance of this state- 
 ment, so similar in Buddhism and in Christianity ; 
 the truth is that the easiest thing is sometimes the 
 most difficult to accomplish. A change of heart seems 
 a trifling circumstance, but it implies a change of the 
 entire man and of his whole life. The invocations 
 of the Saviour — be his title Buddha or Christ —im- 
 plies the adoption of his views of life and moral 
 maxims. 
 
 The tract now introduces a worldly-minded man, 
 whose egotism is characterized in these words : 
 
 *Hsin j|^\ means " heart." 
 
258 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 [An unbeliever says :— ] 
 " I see other men die, 
 My heart is burning like fire. 
 I am not anxious about other men, 
 But [I tremble] because the wheel comes to me too." 
 
 The priest replies :— ] 
 " If you wish to escape the ills of life and death, 
 At once invoke Buddha's name. 
 If in life you invoke his name 
 Hereafter you shall reap the highest bliss.*' 
 PikiUy Pikiuni, Yiuposeh, Yiupoi. 
 
 ** Virtuous men, virtuous women, and the other devotees of 
 
 Buddha 
 Shall all together go to the Western Paradise. 
 On seeing this tract reflect, reflect. 
 Kaolaishan, disciple of Buddha, native of Chihli has engraved 
 
 it and given away as an act of merit. The block 
 
 he retains in his own keeping. 
 " Respect printed paper." 
 
 Such is the Chinese tract according to the Chris- 
 tian missionary's translation, with a few emendations 
 of my own. Aside from the suggested change of the 
 sense in the main passage, 1 have only taken the lib- 
 erties which are of a purely literary character, re- 
 placing such phrases as " repeat Buddha's name " by 
 " invoke Buddha's name," " article of death " by 
 " domain of death," and the abbreviation " Mito " 
 by the full name " Amitabha Buddha," which latter 
 form is better known. 
 
 The translator may, in spite of the mistakes which 
 he made in several passages, be a good Chinese scholar, 
 but he betrays his utter ignorance of Buddhism by his 
 explanation of the words Pikiu, Pikiuni, Yiuposeh, 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 259 
 
 Yiupoi. These words are the Chinese forms of the 
 Sanskrit words BhiJcshu^ BMJcshuni ;^ JJjpasaka, 
 
 Upasika which means " monks, nuns ; male lay dis- 
 ciples and female lay disciples." The translation of 
 the Sanskrit words is given in the next following 
 line, but the Christian missionary, in translating the 
 placard, explains the words in a foot-note as : 
 
 '* A Buddhist charm, probably derived from Indian names. 
 The words have no significance whatever, being merely re- 
 peated as a kind of magic." 
 
 The words BhiJcshu^ Bhihshuni, TJpasaka^ Upor 
 aika^ may be unknown to those Chinese people who 
 received no religious education, but among Buddhists 
 they are common terms ; and what shall we think 
 of a missionary who lives in China for the purpose 
 of converting Buddhists, but is so unacquainted Avith 
 Buddhism that he regards the words with which^the 
 congregation is commonly addressed as a kind of 
 magic ? Imagine that a Buddhist came to America 
 and would not know what the ^ov^^ pastor, deacon, 
 and cJiurch meraber or cominunicant meant, and 
 would explain them to be unmeaning words used as 
 a charm ! 
 
 The whole placard is encompassed with two rows 
 of little circles, which surround the hymns that ap- 
 
 * In Pali BMkkhu,Bhikkhuni. The Sanskrit Bhikshuni is not 
 an original and legitimate Sanskrit word, but one of those 
 later terms which has been formed after the analogy of the 
 correspondent Pali form, 
 
260 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 pear in the shape of a priest's picture like a frame ; 
 and at the right-hand side we read the injunction to 
 fill out the little circles with a red pencil on each 
 three hundred times that the Refuge formula has 
 been repeated. 
 
 The Christian translator of the tract condemns 
 severely the pagan habit of repeating Buddha's name 
 innumerable times, and we do not hesitate to join 
 him in his disapproval. But he ought to consider 
 first that the repetition of prayers or formulas is a 
 practical method of impressing religious truths on 
 the hearts of the people ; it is in a certain stage of 
 culture as commendable as the method of teaching 
 the multiplication tables by making children commit 
 them to memory ; and, secondly, that the Christians, 
 too, have to a great extent availed themselves of 
 this method by enjoining people to repeat the Lord's 
 Prayer over and over again. The practice of repeat- 
 ing the Refuge Formula and of repeating the Lord's 
 Prayer are on the same level, and, if it is to be con- 
 demned in one case, why should we not denounce the 
 other as well ? The Buddhist Refuge Formula (in 
 Chinese 0-mi-to-fu, which means " I take my refuge 
 in Buddha ") is the vow which Buddhists make to 
 pacify their emotions, and vows are the only prayers 
 which Buddhism allows. This prayer a Buddhist is 
 expected to have in his heart whatever he does, — 
 when he lies down to sleep, when he rises in the 
 morning, when he stands, when he walks, when he is 
 in good health, when he is sick, and when he faces 
 death. The Christian translator says : " And there 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 261 
 
 is none to answer, nor any even to hear." He con- 
 tinues : 
 
 *' Listen to that cry going up from thousands of trembling 
 lips, ay, from millions of suffering hearts, daily, hourly, mo- 
 mentarily ; a monotonous, unceasing repetition. 
 
 *' And remember that Jesus hears it always : that he died in 
 response to its unspoken pain and sorrow. Remember that, 
 having committed to us its deep, all-satisfying reply. He says 
 to us to-day, " Go ye into all the world and preach THE GOS- 
 PEL to every creature." 
 
 This is a strong appeal to Christians for mission- 
 arizing, but it is no argument against Buddhism, or 
 Buddhist vows. I am fully aware of the difference 
 which it makes whether the people take their refuge 
 in Jesus or in Buddha, for it is not the name only, 
 but the whole world-conception connected with the 
 name. Behind the names there are realities. But 
 with all the difference that is implied in names, we 
 must not imagine that there is a peculiar magic 
 power in the name itself. 
 
 Such an educated Christian as Lavater believed 
 that the exorcisms of Gassner were efficacious on 
 account of the holiness of the name of Jesus. He 
 thouo:ht that the word " Jesus " could be used like a 
 spell, or like the charm of the Indian medicine man. 
 And this seems to be the view of the Christian trans- 
 lator of the Buddhist tract before us. Shall we say 
 that the Buddhist contemplations of the vanity of 
 earthly life and the seriousness of death are pagan 
 notions so long as the request is made to invoke Bud- 
 
262 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 dha's name, and would these same thoughts rise to 
 the dignity of Christian sentiment if only the name 
 Buddha Amitabha were replaced by Jesus Christ ? 
 
 Justice demands us to consider the worth of our 
 argument also from the standpoint of our opponents. 
 Might not Buddhists reply in the same strain ? They 
 might say : " Did not Buddha, too, send out his dis- 
 ciples with the words which we quote literally as 
 follows : 
 
 " * Go ye now, O bhikshus, for the benefit of the 
 many, for the welfare of mankind, out of compassion 
 for the world. Preach the doctrine which is glorious 
 in the beginning, glorious in the middle, and glorious 
 in the end, in the spirit as well as in the letter. There 
 are beings whose eyes are scarcely covered with dust, 
 but if the doctrine is not preached to them they 
 cannot attain salvation. Proclaim to them a life of 
 holiness. They will understand the doctrine and 
 accept it." 
 
 Apparently there is a Christianity which is not 
 yet free from paganism and lacks charitableness in 
 judging others. Buddhists might on the same ground 
 regard Christian prayers as objectionable. Yet they 
 will scarcely do so, for whatever advantages the 
 Christian nations have over the followers of Buddha 
 (and there can be no question about it that these 
 advantages are great), in one respect Buddhism has 
 the preference over Christianitj^ It is its breadth 
 and comprehensiveness. Buddhists would not say of 
 Mohammed, or Zoroaster, or Confucius that they are 
 false prophets. Buddhists recognize the prophetic 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 263 
 
 nature of all religious leaders. Sir Monier M. Wil- 
 liams quotes the following Buddhistic commandment : 
 
 " Never think or say that your own religion is the best. Never 
 denounce the religion of others." 
 
 It was Ashoka, a Buddhist emperor, who convened 
 about two thousand years ago the first parliament 
 of religions in which he requested the sages of his 
 large empire to discuss the differences of their re- 
 spective faiths in brotherly kindness. 
 
 Ashoka's twelfth edict declares : 
 
 " There ought to be reverence for one's own faith and no 
 reviling of that of others." 
 
 I have not as yet met a Buddhist who would not 
 look upon Christ with reverence as the Buddha of 
 Western nations. 
 
 R. SPENCE HARDY. 
 
 As an instance of the wrong spirit that animates 
 many (I do not say " all ") of our' missionaries, I 
 refer to the book of a man for whose intellectual 
 and moral qualities I cherish the highest opinion. 
 
 The Rev. R. Spence Hardy, the famous Buddhist 
 scholar to whose industry we owe several valuable 
 contributions to our knowledge of Buddhism, has 
 written a book, The Legends and Theories of the 
 Buddhists Compared with History and Science, in 
 which he treats Buddhism with extraordinary injus- 
 tice. This is not in the interest of Christianity, for 
 it is nothing but the spirit of injustice that alien- 
 
264 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 ates the sympathies of non-Christian people toward 
 Christianity. 
 
 It is strange that Mr. Hardy's unfair statements 
 are made with no apparent malice, but from a sheer 
 habit which has been acquired through the notion 
 of the exclusiveness of Christianity. 
 
 In making these critical remarks I do not wish to 
 offend, but to call attention to a fault which can and 
 should be avoided in the future. 
 
 Spence Hardy says in his book, Tlie Legends cmd 
 Theories of Buddhists Com/pared with History and 
 Science (pp. 138, 140) : 
 
 "The tales that are told about the acts performed by Bud- 
 dha, and the wonders attendant on these acts, need only be 
 stated, in order to be rejected at once from the realm of reality 
 and truth. . . . These things are too absurd to require serious 
 refutation." 
 
 Mr. Hardy forgets that many " tales told about 
 the acts performed by Jesus, and the wonders attend- 
 ant on the acts," too, need only be stated, in order 
 to be rejected at once from the realm of reality 
 and truth. Mr. Hardy recognizes the paganism of 
 others, but he does not see that he himself is still 
 entangled in pagan notions. What would Mr. 
 Hardy say if a Buddhist were to write exactly the 
 same book only changing the word Christ into Bud- 
 dha and making other little changes of the same 
 nature. Buddhists, requested by a Christian mis- 
 sionary to believe literally in Christ's walking upon 
 the water or being bodily lifted up to heaven, are, 
 as much as Spence Hardy, entitled to say : " These 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 265 
 
 things are too absurd to require serious refutation." 
 Mr. Hardy protests (p. 137) : 
 
 *' I deny all that is said about the passing through the air of 
 Buddha and his disciples, or of their being able to visit the 
 Dewa and Brahma worlds." 
 
 If history and science refute the miracles attrib- 
 uted in the later Buddhistic literature to Buddha, 
 why not those attributed to Christ ? And we must 
 assume that Mr. Hardy does not deny that Christ 
 descended to hell and that he passed through the 
 air when carried up to heaven in his ascension. 
 
 Mr. Hardy speaks of "the errors of Buddhism 
 that are contrary to fact as taught by established 
 and uncontroverted science " (p. 135), but he appears 
 to reject science whenever it comes into collision 
 with a literal interpretation of Christian doctrines. 
 Buddhism is to him a fraud, Christianity divine 
 revelation. He says of Buddhism (pp. 210-211, 
 313, 207) : 
 
 " I must confess that the more closely I look into the sys- 
 tem, the less respect I feel for the character of its originators. 
 That which at first sight appears to be the real glory of Bud- 
 dhism, its moral code, loses all its distinction when minutely 
 examined. Its seeming brightness is not that of the morning 
 star, leading onward to intenser radiance but that of the 
 meteor ; and not even that ; for the meteor warns the trav- 
 eller that the dangerous morass is near, [sic .^] Buddhism makes 
 a fool of man by promising to guide him to safety, while it 
 leads him to the very verge of the fatal precipice. . . . The 
 people who profess this system know nothing of the solemn 
 thought implied by the question, ' How can I do this great 
 wickedness and sin against God ? ' . . . The operation of the 
 
266 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 mind is no different in mode to that of the eye, or ear, vision 
 is eye-touch, hearing is ear-touch, and thinking is heart- 
 touch. The man, as we have repeatedly seen, is a mere mass, 
 a cluster, a name and nothing more. . . . There is no law, 
 because there is no law-giver, no authority from which law 
 can proceed." 
 
 Man is " a cluster," means that the unity of man's 
 soul is a unification— a truth on which all prominent 
 psychologists and naturalists of Christian countries 
 agree with Buddha. In the same sense Hume char- 
 acterized the human soul as a bundle of sensations 
 and ideas. Man is an organism consisting of a great 
 number of living structures, which in their co-opera- 
 tion constitute a well-regulated commonwealth of 
 sentient functions. And why should there be no 
 law if there is no law-giver ? Is the law of gravity 
 unreal because of its mathematical nature, which 
 indicates that it is of an intrinsic necessity and 
 requires a law-giver as little as the arithmetical law 
 2x2=4. Is 2x2=4 a reliable rule only if a per- 
 sonal God has decreed it ? The moral law is of the 
 same kind ! 
 
 Buddha regards the order of the world not as the 
 invention of either Brahma or any other God, but 
 as an eternal and unconditional law as rigid as the 
 number-relations, which we formulate in arithmet- 
 ical propositions. Does such a view of man's soul 
 and the nature of the moral dispensation of life 
 indeed annul all moral responsibility ? Buddhism 
 does not employ the same symbolical terms as 
 Christianity, but it is not devoid of an authority of 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 267 
 
 moral conduct. Mr. Spence Hardy is so accustomed 
 to the Christian terminology, that he, from the 
 start, misconstrues all other modes of expression. 
 
 In other passages Mr. Hardy refers to Buddha's 
 tales in which Buddha speaks of his experiences in 
 previous existences. He says (p. 153) : 
 
 '* These facts are sufficient to convince every observant 
 mind that what Buddha says about his past births, and those 
 of others, is an imposition upon the credulity of mankind, 
 without anything whatever to support it from fact." 
 
 Here Mr. Hardy's naivete can only evoke our 
 smiles : Buddhists are no more obliged to accept the 
 Jataka tales as genuine history, than our children 
 are requested to believe the legends of saints or 
 Grimm's fairy tales. There are Buddhists who be- 
 lieve the Jataka tales, and there are many Christians, 
 especially in Eoman Catholic countries, who believe 
 the legends of saints. 
 
 Speaking in this connexion of the fossil remains 
 of extinct animals, Mr. Hardy says (p. 150) : 
 
 *' Of many of the curious creatures that formerly existed 
 only a few fragments have been found. Among them are 
 birds of all sizes, from an ostrich to a crow, and lizards with 
 a bird's beak and feet. . . . The Himalayas contain the re- 
 mains of a gigantic land tortoise. The megatherium lies in 
 the vast plains of South America, etc. , etc. . . . Now if Bud- 
 dha lived in these distant ages, and had a perfect insight into 
 their circumstances, as he tells us he had, how is it that we 
 have no intimation whatever in any of his numerous refer- 
 ences to the past, that the world was so different in these 
 respects to what it is now ? . . . The only conclusion we can 
 come to is, that he knew nothing about the beasts that roamed 
 in other lands, or tlie birds that flew in other skies ; and that 
 
268 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 as lie was ignorant of their existence he could not introduce 
 them into his tales." 
 
 It is right that Mr. Hardy appeals to the tribunal 
 of science against the narrowness of a belief in the 
 letter of the Buddhistic Jatakas ; but why does he 
 not sweep first before his own door ? Unfortunately, 
 the same objections can be made to Christ, who 
 said : " Before Abraham was I am," apparently 
 meaning that he had existed aeons before his birth. 
 There is a great similarity between the pre-existence 
 of Christ and of Buddha, especially when we con- 
 sider the later doctrine of Amitabha, the infinite 
 light of Buddhahood, which is omnipresent and 
 eternal. While Christ claims to have existed before 
 Abraham, he gives us no information about the fos- 
 sil animals that have of late been found by geolo- 
 gists. Ingersoll speaks of Christ in the same way 
 as Spence Hardy does of Buddha. He says: *'If 
 he truly was the Son of God, he ought to have 
 known the future ; he ought to have told us some- 
 thing about the IN'ew World ; he ought to have 
 broken the bonds of slavery. Why did he not do 
 it ? And Ingersoll concludes : " Because he was not 
 the Son of God. He was a man who knew nothing 
 and understood nothing." When Ingersoll speaks 
 in these terms, he is accused of flippancy, but Mr. 
 Hardy's seriousness is not to be doubted. 
 
 What would Christians say of a Buddhist, who, 
 with the same logic, commenting on analogous 
 Christian traditions, would say of Christ what Mr. 
 Hardy says of Buddha ! Mr. Hardy says : 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 269 
 
 ** I have proved that Buddhism is not a revelation of truth ; 
 that its founder was an erring and imperfect teacher, and 
 ignorant of many things that are now universally known ; 
 and that the claim to the exercise of omniscience made for 
 him by his followers is an imposition and pretence. . . . We 
 can only regard Buddha as an impostor." 
 
 This is strong language, and I am sorry for Mr. 
 Hardy that he has forgottten himself and all rules 
 of justice and fairness in his missionary zeal 
 
 Even Buddha's broadness in recognizing the good 
 wherever he found it, is stigmatized by Mr. Hardy. 
 He says (p. 215) : 
 
 *' Buddha acknowledges that there are things excellent in 
 other religions, and hence he did not persecute. He declares 
 that even his opponents had a degree of wisdom and exercised 
 a miraculous power. But this very indifference about error, 
 as about everything else, this apparent candor and catholicity, 
 is attended by an influence too often fatal to the best interests 
 of those by whom it is professed." 
 
 Mr. Hardy condemns " this apparent candor and 
 catholicity" as "indifference about error," and he 
 adds (p. 216) : 
 
 " To be a Christian a man must regard Buddha as a false 
 teacher." 
 
 Mr. Hardy, apparently intending to palliate his 
 harsh remarks, says : 
 
 " I am here a controversialist, and not an expositor." (P. 
 206.) 
 
 But even as a controversialist, he should not lower 
 himself by making unjust accusations. It is neither 
 
270 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 right nor wise ; for the liberties which he takes must 
 be granted to his opponents ; and if they refuse to 
 use them, it is to their credit. 
 
 Mr. Hardy says : " These conclusions I have 
 founded upon statements taken from the sacred 
 writings," and he rejects Buddhism on account of 
 these errors wholesale. I^or would he permit Bud- 
 dhists to discriminate between Buddha's doctrine 
 and later additions. For, says Mr. Hardy (p. 219) : 
 
 " By rejecting other parts of the Pitakas as being unworthy 
 of credence, and yet founding upon them, and upon them 
 alone, your trust in the words they ascribe to Buddha, you do 
 that which no wise worshipper would do, and what you have 
 no liberty to do as a man guided by the requirements of rea- 
 son." 
 
 This is a dangerous principle for Mr. Hardy to 
 propound, for it should be applicable to all religions, 
 and what would become of Christianity if it had to 
 be kept under the bondage of the letter, so that we 
 should no longer be allowed to discriminate between 
 truth and error, but adopt or reject at once the 
 whole fabric. If one discrepancy of the dogmatic 
 texture of a religion with science or with reason 
 disposes of it as a fraud, what shall we do with 
 Christianity ? 
 
 Spence Hardy's attitude toward Buddhism is 
 typical for a certain class of Christians whose 
 Christianity is little more than a highly advanced 
 paganism. 
 
 Happily there are Christians who see deeper, and 
 they feel no animosity against Buddhism on account 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 271 
 
 of its many agreements with Christian doctrines. 
 As their spokesman we quote Prof. Max Mtiller, 
 who says : 
 
 "If I do find in certain Buddhist works doctrines identic- 
 ally the same as in Christianity, so far from being frightened, 
 I feel delighted, for surely truth is not the less true because it 
 is believed by the majority of the human race." 
 
 CHARLES GUTZLAFF. 
 
 Speaking of the critics of Buddhism among the 
 missionaries, we must not forget to mention the Eev. 
 Charles Gutzlaff, a German, who enjoys an unde- 
 served reputation for scholarship among people un- 
 acquainted with his writings. His two-volumed 
 work, China Ojpened^^ is full of the grossest errors, 
 which are scarcely pardonable in an illiterate man 
 who lived only a short time in the Middle Kingdom. 
 E"ote only this tremendous mistake : Speaking of 
 Confucius, who, as is well known, was not an original 
 thinker or author, but a conservative preserver of 
 the wisdom of the sages of yore, Gutzlaff says : 
 
 "Antecedent to him, China does not appear to have pos- 
 sessed any men of genius ; or if it did possess them, both 
 themselves and their works have long passed into oblivion." 
 
 As though Fu Hi, Fli the Great, "Wu Wang, Wen 
 Wang, and innumerable other sages, among them 
 Lau-tsze, who were born before Confucius, had 
 
 * London : Smith, Elder, & Co., 1838. The author's name 
 is spelled " Gutzlaff " in the English edition. The German 
 spelling is ' ' Gutzlaff. " 
 
272 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 either not existed or passed into oblivion ! The Shu 
 King is a collection of songs, all of which are older 
 than Confucius. 
 
 Other blunders, such as attributing to Confucius 
 himself the well-known classic on filial piety, which 
 is written either by Tsang-tsze or by a scholar be- 
 longing to the school of Tsang-tsze, are scattered 
 throughout Gutzlaff's book. 
 
 Gutzlaff pretends to have read books of which he 
 knows very little. In explanation of Lau-tsze's term 
 tau (reason, logos, path), he says : 
 
 *' Commentators differ as to the meaning of this word. We 
 cite the opinions only of the two most celebrated of them. 
 According to the best author, Taou is the art of governing a 
 country ; but another observes, that the Taou is shapeless, or 
 invisible, and maintains and nourishes heaven and earth. It 
 is devoid of affection, but moves the sun and moon ; it is 
 nameless, but contributes towards the growth and sustenance 
 of all creatures. It is something undefined, to which it is 
 difficult to assign a name, which however may be called Taou, 
 for want of a better." 
 
 Gutzlaff does not name these " two most celebrated 
 commentators," for it is one of his habits never to 
 quote authorities or to give references. But any one 
 who ever glanced through Lau-tsze's short booklet 
 could not have overlooked that these '' opinions " 
 are simply loose and inaccurate quotations from Lau- 
 tsze's Tau-teh-king. 
 
 Mr. Meadows, Chinese interpreter in H. M. Civil 
 Service, in his book, The ChiTiese and Their Rebel- 
 lions^ is not too severe on Gutzlaff, when he says 
 (p. 376): 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 273 
 
 *' Probably few men have excelled Dr. Gutzlaff in the capac- 
 ity for rapidly inditing sentences containing a number of 
 propositions not one of which should be correct. In fact all 
 his labors are characterized by a superficiality, a lack of 
 thorough research, and a profusion of unfounded asser- 
 tion." 
 
 Gutzlaff's opinions on China and Buddhism would 
 certainly not be worth mentioning if he were not 
 sometimes regarded and quoted as an authority 
 whose statements are willingly accepted on account 
 of his supposed scholarship and long residence in 
 China. 
 
 Gutzlaff devotes a long chapter to religion ; speak- 
 ing of Buddhism, he says : 
 
 ** The life of the founder of this idolatry is enveloped in so 
 much mystery, that his very existence has been doubted by 
 some, whilst others have presumed, that there lived and 
 taught, at different periods, various persons of this name." 
 
 "His name greatly varies according to the countries where 
 his tenets have been received. Thus we have it pronounced 
 Budha, Budhu, Budse, Gautema, Samonokodam, Fuh, or Fo, 
 etc., all designating one and the same individual." 
 
 As if the title Buddha, the Enlightened One, were 
 a name, and of the same kind as " Gautama " ! Gutz- 
 laff continues : 
 
 "He inculcated mercy towards animals, prohibited the 
 killing of any living creature, and enjoined good- will towards 
 all mankind. His disciples wrote down tliese instructions, 
 which, inclusive of the commentaries, amounted to two hun- 
 dred and thirty-two volumes. The writer has perused several 
 of them in the Siamese Pale, and if ever any work contained 
 nonsense, it is the religious code of Budhu, " 
 1$ 
 
274 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Siamese can only be the language spoken in Siam, 
 and Pale (or as it is now commonly spelled Pali) is 
 the vernacular spoken in the kingdom of Maghada 
 in Buddha's time, which has become the classical 
 language of Buddhism. What Siamese Pali may be, 
 no one except the Kev. Mr. Gutzlaff knows. 
 
 Gutzlaff continues in the next paragraph, " his 
 [Buddha's] own uncle rose against him," probably 
 meaning Devadatta, his cousin. He further says : 
 
 *• The most superficial observer will discover in this system 
 some resemblance to a spurious kind of Christianity. If we do 
 not admit that tlie human mind will always have recourse to 
 the same follies, we may presume that these ceremonies were 
 borrowed from the Nestorians of the seventh century, a period 
 which exactly coincides with a great reform in the Tibetian 
 system of Budhuism. 
 
 "The providence of God, in permitting so many millions 
 blindly to follow this superstition, is indeed mysterious. We 
 can only adore where we are unable to comprehend. Yet, 
 amongst all pagans, the Budhuists are the least bigoted. They 
 allow that other religions contain some truth, but think that 
 their own is the best, and the most direct road to heaven. 
 Amongst the myriads of idols they worship, there are no 
 obscene representations, nor do they celebrate any orgies." 
 
 We do not doubt that Chinese Buddhism is full of 
 distortions and superstitions, but even here we find 
 still preserved the purity, the breadth, and the moral 
 earnestness of the great founder of the Keligion of 
 Enlightenment. 
 
 The Buddhistic description of Hell, as given by 
 Gutzlaff on page 224, differs from the old-fashioned 
 Christian Hell only in unimportant details, and the 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 275 
 
 injunction to repeat the refuge formula, me to 
 Fuh ! on all occasions for the sake of " having Fuh 
 both in the mind and in the mouth," is quite analo- 
 gous to the constant repetition of the Lord's Pra3^er, 
 which is practised in all Christian countries. The 
 worship of Fuh, as prescribed by various sects, is 
 neither more nor less pagan than the worship of 
 Christ among Christians. Gutzlaff quotes from a 
 Buddhist work, the title of which he does not name, 
 the following passage : 
 
 ** Let each seek a retired room, and sweep it clean ; place 
 there an image of Fuh, every day burn a pot of pure incense, 
 place a cup of clean water, and when evening conies, light a 
 lamp before the image. Whether painted on paper, or carved 
 in wood, the figure is just the same as the true Fuh ; let us 
 love it as our father and mother, venerate it as our prince and 
 ruler. Morning and evening, let us worship it with sincerity 
 and reverence, fall prostrate before it like the tumbling of a 
 mountain, and rise up with dignity like the ascent of clouds. 
 On leaving the room report it [bid it farewell] ; returning, let 
 us give notice [greet it] ; and even when we travel, at the dis- 
 tance of five or ten le, let us act as in the presence of our 
 Fuh." 
 
 Among other extracts from " native works," Gutz- 
 laff quotes the following passage : 
 
 " The laws of Budhuism are boundless as the ocean, and the 
 search after them is as little tiresome as that after precious 
 stones. He who has transgressed them ought to repent ; he 
 who never acted against them may silently ponder upon them, 
 and thus know the purity of exalted virtue." 
 
 Happening to know this verse as a formula in 
 common use among the Chinese and Japanese Bud- 
 
276 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 dhists, I can from memory point out a few gross 
 mistakes in Gutzlaff's translation, without even hav- 
 ing at present the original at hand. It must read 
 about as follows : 
 
 " The religion of Buddha is as boundless as the ocean. 
 
 The search after it is more remunerative than that after pre- 
 cious stones. 
 
 He who has transgressed Buddha's injunctions ought to re- 
 pent. 
 
 He who has never sinned, may in silence ponder upon them. 
 
 Thus he wiU comprehend the purity of exalted virtue." 
 
 G, VOIGT AlTD ADOLPH THOMAS. 
 
 From among the German critics of Buddhism I 
 select for discussion two Protestant clergymen, G. 
 Yoigt and Adolph Thomas, whose remarks seem to 
 me worthy of notice. 
 
 G. Yoigt * declares that Buddhism did not origi- 
 nate in the whim of a maniac or in the hallucination 
 of an enthusiast, but is born out of the very depths 
 of the human heart. Its aspirations remind us of 
 St. Paul's cry : " O wretched man that I am I Who 
 shall deliver me from the body of this death!" 
 (Rom. vii. 24.) "But," adds Mr. Yoigt, "Buddha 
 cannot deliver mankind, he cannot conquer the 
 world because he denies it ; and he cannot deny the 
 world, because he does not conquer it. Christianity 
 alone is the world-religion because it alone conquers 
 
 *"Buddhismus und Christenthum," in Zeitfragen deschr, 
 Volkslebens. Heilbronn: Henninger. 1887. 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 277 
 
 the world" (p. 19). "Buddha's salvation is self- 
 deliverance, and this is the first and decisive condi- 
 tion of the Buddhistic Gospel. It refers man, in 
 order to gain his eternal salvation, to the proud but 
 utterly barren path of his own deeds " (p. 22). 
 
 Here the Buddhistic scheme of salvation is the 
 same (Yoigt claims) as that of Goethe's Faust (p. 31), 
 for Faust, too, does not rely on the blood of Christ, 
 but has to work out his salvation himself. Accord- 
 ingly, one main difference between Christ and 
 Buddha consists in this, that Christ is the Saviour 
 of mankind while Buddha only claims to be the 
 discoverer of a path that leads to salvation (p. 35). 
 
 Mr. Yoigt's statement concerning Buddha's doc- 
 trine of salvation is to the point ; but we have to 
 add that while Buddhism is indeed self-salvation, 
 Christianity may, at least in a certain sense, also be 
 called self-salvation. In another sense. Buddhism, 
 too, teaches the salvation of mankind, not through 
 self-exertion, but through the light of Buddha. 
 
 Mr. Yoigt is a Protestant and a Lutheran ; there- 
 fore he presses the point that we are justified not 
 through our own deeds, but through God's grace 
 who takes compassion on us. To Lutherans it will 
 be interesting to knOw that there is a kind of Pro- 
 testant sect among the Buddhists (and they are the 
 most numerous and influential sect in Japan), the 
 Shin-Shiu, who insist on salvation sola fide^ through 
 faith alone, with the same vigor as did Luther. They 
 eat meat and fish, and their priests marry as freely 
 as Evangelical clergymen. The statement made by ' 
 
278 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 A. Akamatsu for presentation at the "World's relig- 
 ious parliament and published in leaflets by the 
 Buddhist Propagation Society declares : 
 
 ** Rejecting all religious austerities and other action, giving 
 up all the idea of self -power, we rely upon Amita Buddha with 
 the whole heart, for our salvation in the future life, which is 
 the most important thing : believing that at the moment of 
 putting our faith in Amita Buddha, our salvation is settled. 
 From that moment, invocation of his name is observed to ex- 
 press gratitude and thankfulness for Buddha's mercy ; more- 
 over, being thankful for the reception of this doctrine from 
 the founder and succeeding chief priests whose teachings 
 were so benevolent, and as welcome as light in a dark night ; 
 we must also keep the laws which are fixed for our duty during 
 our whole life." 
 
 Keplace the words " Amita Buddha " by "Jesus 
 Christ " and no Lutheran of the old dogmatic type 
 would make any serious objection to this formula- 
 tion of a religious creed. 
 
 Let us now turn to points on which Mr. Yoigt 
 fails to do justice to Buddhism, not because he 
 means to be unfair, but because he is absolutely 
 unable to understand the Buddhistic doctrines. 
 
 Buddhism in Mr. Yoigt's opinion is full of contra- 
 dictions, for " the idea of retribution can no longer 
 be upheld if there is no ego-unit " (p. 23), and " the 
 standard of Christian morality is God, but Bud- 
 dhism, ignoring God, has no such standard of 
 morality " (p. 43). Yoigt maintains : 
 
 "He who denies the living Grod, must consistently deny 
 also the living soul — of course, not the soul as mental life, the 
 existence of which through our experience is sufiiciently guar- 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 279 
 
 an teed, but the soul as the unit and the personal centre of all 
 mental life. In this sense Buddhism denies the existence of a 
 soul" (p. 22). 
 
 Why can the idea of retribution no longer be up- 
 held if the soul is a unification and not a metaphysical 
 soul-unit ? Why can Buddhism have no standard of 
 morality, if Buddha's conception of moral authority 
 is not that of a personal being, but that of an imma- 
 nent law in analogy with natural laws and in fact 
 only an application of the law of cause and effect ? 
 It is the same misconception which we found in Mr. 
 Spence Hardy's arguments, when he said " There is 
 no law, because there is no law-giver." 
 
 Adolph Thomas, another German clergyman, 
 criticises Buddhism in a lecture which he delivered 
 in various cities of North America. It bears the 
 title "A Sublime Fool of the Good Lord." The lec- 
 ture is a curious piece of composition, for it is a 
 glowing tribute to Buddha's greatness and at the 
 same time a vile jeer at his religion. Here is a trans- 
 lation of its best passages : 
 
 "I will show unto you, dear friends, a sublime fool of the 
 Almighty. Miniature copies you will find, not a few, in the 
 large picture gallery of the world's history. I show you a 
 colossal statue. It represents Shaky amuni, the founder of the 
 first universal religion, to whom the admiring generations of 
 after-ages gave the honoring title of Buddha, i. e., the Enlight- 
 ened One. Out of the dawn of remote antiquity, through the 
 mist of legendary lore, his grand figure looms up to us belated 
 mortals, lofty as the summit of the Himalayas towering into 
 the clouds above. He stands upon the heights of Oriental 
 humanity, his divine head enveloped by the clouds of incense, 
 
280 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 sending his praise upwards from millions of temples. The 
 equal rival of Jesus Christ cannot be otherwise than sublime. 
 
 " Buddha possesses that soul-stirring sublimity which wins 
 the hearts with a double charm, by the contrast of natural 
 dignity and voluntary humiliation, of nobility of mind and 
 kindness of soul. This son of a king, who stretches forth his 
 hand to the timid and rag-covered Tshandala girl, saying : 
 ' My daughter, my law is a law of grace for all men,' appeai-s 
 at once as winning souls and as commanding respect. The 
 cry of woe with which he departs from the luxurious royal 
 chambers, full of sweet music and pleasures of the table, 
 full of the beauty of women and the joys of love ; ' Woe is me ! 
 I am indeed upon a charnel field ! ' thrills the very soul. The 
 alms-begging hermit, to whose sublime mind royal highness 
 was too low, the splendors of court too mean, the power of 
 a ruler too small, must have inspired with reverence even 
 the gluttonous and amorous epicurean. A prince who was 
 capable of mortifying soul and body by retirement, fasting, 
 and meditation during six long years to find a deliverance 
 from the ocean of sorrows for all sentient beings, bears in- 
 deed the stamp of those staunch and mighty men of character, 
 who are able to sacrifice everything for an idea. ' Son con- 
 stant heroisme,' says the latest French biographer of the 
 ancient founder of Buddhism, concerning his character, 
 * egale sa conviction. II est le modele acheve de tous les vertus 
 qu'il preche.' 
 
 " Buddha towers above the ordinary teacher not less by his 
 intellectual geniality, than by his moral excellence. Five 
 hundred years before the birth of Christ did this far-seeing 
 thinker anticipate the most far-reaching views in the field of 
 natural sciences and the freest social advances of the nine- 
 teenth century. This very ancient saint of the interior of 
 Asia was a champion of free thought and liberty after the 
 most modern conception. He looked at the world with the 
 unsophisticated eye of a scientist of our days, seeing in it a 
 chain of causes and effects in continuous change, birth and 
 death, forever repeating themselves, or perhaps with the short- 
 sightedness of a fashionable materialist, seeing in it nothing 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OP BUDDHISM. 281 
 
 but the product of matter which to him exists exclusively. 
 A priest of humanity centuries before a Christ and Paul broke 
 through the barriers of the Jewish ceremonial service, thou- 
 sands of years before a Lessing and Herder preached the newly- 
 discovered gospel of pure humanity, Buddha revealed to the 
 people of India and China, to Mongolians, Malayans, the never- 
 heard-of truth that upon the earth and in heaven humanity 
 alone had merit. 
 
 " The moral code of Buddhism has given a purer expression 
 to natural morality and has kept it more free from natural 
 prejudices and religious admixtures than any of the later 
 religions. 
 
 ''Buddha already held high the banner of philanthropic 
 sympathy, which is perhaps the acknowledged symbol of mod- 
 ern ethics, and before which in oiu* times even the arms of 
 war give way. The humane demand that capital punishment 
 be abolished, which Christianity only now, after nineteen 
 centuries begins to emphasize, had already been realized in 
 Buddhistic countries shortly after the death of the founder of 
 their religion. And in regard to his efforts upon the field of 
 social policy, I venture to call the reformer of India the bold- 
 est champion who has ever fought for the holy cause of liberty; 
 for the tyranny, which he fought — that of the Brahman 
 castes — was the most outrageous violation of the rights of 
 man, and he that fought it was — according to the legend — 
 the descendant of an Oriental dynasty which was of course, 
 as every one of them, a sneer upon the liberty of the people. 
 
 " Sublime in his earthly career by his personal worth, Buddha 
 has still been more elevated in his immortality by the extent 
 and power of his historical effects. He is one of the spiritual 
 kings, whose kingdom is without end and whose train-bearers 
 are nations. The dark chasm of oblivion into which two 
 thousand years have sunk, has not even dimmed his memory. 
 Following the track of the victorious sun, his illustrious name 
 has appeared like a brilliant meteor to us also, the inhabitants 
 of the Far West, the sons of Europe and America. He who 
 is adored like a god by three hundred and seventy millions 
 of people in Asia, took captive also not a few strong minds 
 
282 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 of the German civilized countries. Philosophers and poets 
 like Schopenhauer and Kinkel worshipped at his shrine. 
 
 " His words sound in our ears, also, like words of authority. 
 The dignified pathos that pervades them conquers the souls. 
 
 * Not even feasting with the gods 
 Brings rest unto the truly wise; 
 Who's wise indeed doth but rejoice 
 That no desires within him rise.' 
 
 "The sublimity that lies in his description of his blessed 
 Nirvana is affecting : ' I have attained unto the highest wis- 
 dom, I am without desires, I wish for nothing ; I am without 
 selfishness, personal sentiment, stubbornness, enmity. Until 
 now I was full of hatred, passion, error, a slave of con- 
 ditions, of birth, of age, of sickness, of grief, of pain, of 
 sorrow, of cares, of misfortune. May many thousands leave 
 their homes, live as saints, and after they have lived a life of 
 meditation, and discarded lust, be born again.' 
 
 ** From the sublime to the ridiculous there is but one step. 
 I must laugh when I think of a group of three Japanese idols. 
 This stone monument from the history of Buddhism appears 
 as a comically disgusting caricature of the Christian trinity. 
 
 " Here a striking connexion comes to the surface. A des- 
 piser of the gods became the forerunner of worshippers of 
 idols ; Buddha's doctrine of liberty brought in its train the 
 tyranny of priests, his enlightened views, superstition ; his 
 humanity, the empty ceremonies of sacerdotal deceivers. His 
 attempt at education and emancipation of the people without 
 a god was followed by a period of a senseless and stupefying 
 subjugation of the people ; a striking contrast and lamentable 
 failure indeed ! 
 
 " What an irony of fate. Fate had different intentions from 
 Buddha and forced Buddha to do that which was contrary to 
 what he intended. Like a hunted deer which falls into the 
 net of those from whom it fled, like a deceived fool who 
 accomplishes foreign aims against his will and knowledge, 
 thus India's sublime prince of spirits lies before us, adjudged 
 by the power of fate from which no one can escape. One is 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 283 
 
 reminded of the Jewish poetry of old : * He that sitteth in the 
 heavens shall laugh, the Lord shall have him in derision.' 
 In derision did he, who governs the fates of men, place the 
 fool's cap upon that noble head. The comedies of Aristo- 
 phanes are praised, because a bitter seriousness is heard in 
 their droll laughter. The great author of the world's drama 
 has after all composed a far better satire than the best comic 
 poet of this earth. The monster tragi-comedy, Buddha and 
 Buddhism, which he wrote into the chronicles of the world, 
 moves not only the diaphragm, but the heart also." 
 
 The rest of Mr, Thomas's lecture consits of caustic 
 complaints on the increase of atheism in Christian 
 countries. l!^atural science,* he says, is materialistic. 
 Schopenhauer's pessimism is gaining ascendency in 
 philosophy, and theology tends either to the infidel 
 liberalism of D. Fr. Strauss or favors a reaction that 
 will strengthen the authority of the Pope. Every- 
 where extremes ! He concludes one , of his ha- 
 rangues : 
 
 " It darkens! We are Buddhists and not Christians. . , . 
 Bless us, O Shaky amuni Gautama, * master of cows' — which 
 is the literal translation of 'Gautama.' Why did your wor- 
 shippers not call you * master of oxen' ? " 
 
 Strange that one who ridicules Buddha cannot 
 help extolling him in the highest terms of admira- 
 tion. Mr. Thomas sets out with the purpose of 
 calling Buddha a fool, but the subject of his speech 
 and the greatness of the founder of Buddhism carry 
 him along so as to change his abuse into an anthem 
 of praise. He is like Balaam, who went out to curse 
 Israel but cannot help blessing it. And what can 
 he say against Buddha to substantiate his luirsh 
 
284 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 judgment ? The same things can be said of Christ, 
 for the irony of fate is not less apparent in the history 
 of the un-Christ-like Christian church than in the 
 development of the un-Buddha-like Buddhism. 
 
 The same objections again and .again ! Buddha 
 was an atheist and denied the existence of the soul. 
 The truth is that while the Buddhist terminology 
 radically differs from the Christian mode of naming 
 things, the latter being more mythological, both 
 religions agree upon the whole in ethics, and the 
 spirit of their doctrines is more akin than their 
 orthodox representatives, who cling to the letter of 
 the dogma, are aware of. 
 
 Sm MONIER M0NIEB-WILLIAM8. 
 
 Among the scholarly authors, of university pro- 
 fessors who have written on Buddhism, Sir Monier 
 Monier-Williams, Boden Professor of Sanskrit at 
 Oxford, is one of the most distinguished and pro- 
 minent authorities. Not only are his Sanskrit Dic- 
 tionary, Grammar, and Manual standard works of 
 philological scholarship, but also his translations 
 exhibit the genius of a poet who can re-think and 
 re-feel the ideas of bards who lived in ages long past 
 and uttered thoughts which it is difficult for us to 
 comprehend in their original significance. There 
 can be no doubt but Sir Monier Monier-Williams's 
 books on Brahmanism and Hinduism and on Bud- 
 dhism give us most reliable and instructive informa- 
 tion concerning the two great religions of India, and 
 
CHRISTIAN CEITICS OF BUDDHISM. 285 
 
 I confess that their study has proved to me extremel j 
 profitable. But one point challenges my opposi- 
 tion ; it is, not that he writes from the standpoint 
 of a Christian, for he has not only a right, but is 
 even under the obligation, to do so ; nor is it that his 
 works possess the character of contributions to 
 Christian apologetics, a mission which is implied in 
 the duties of the Boden professorship held by him : 
 it is that he narrows Christianity to the dogmatic 
 conception of the Anglican church creeds, and estab- 
 lishes on this ground distinctions which, if tenable, 
 will not, as Sir Monier believes, lift Christianity 
 above Buddhism, but, on the contrary, would give 
 the first place to Buddhism and annul all the claims 
 that Christianity may make to catholicity. 
 
 Professor Williams openly states that he has " de- 
 picted Buddhism from the standpoint of a believer 
 in Christianity " (p. ix), and when delivering in 1888 
 his Duff-Lectures which form the nucleus of his book 
 on Buddhism, he expressed his " deep sense of the 
 responsibility which the writing of these Lectures 
 had laid upon him and his earnest desire that they 
 may by their usefulness prove in some degree 
 worthy of the great missionary whose name they 
 bear." * Even the title of the book announces that 
 Buddhism is treated " in its contrast with Christian- 
 ity." 
 
 After these statements we are prepared for an ex 
 parte exposition of Buddha's doctrines which, how- 
 ever, considering the antagonistic attitude of Sir 
 
 * Quoted literally, only changing " me " into " him,' ' 
 
286 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Monier Monier- Williams is as just and fair as can be 
 expected. The book is valuable on account of its 
 author's unquestionable ability in selecting and 
 marshalling his materials in a masterly way, but it 
 is marred by repeated attempts to belittle Buddha, 
 " who," Sir Monier says, " if not worthy to be called 
 the * Light of Asia,' and certainly unworthy of com- 
 parison with the ' Light of the World,' was at least 
 one of the world's most successful teachers." In 
 spite of Buddha's alleged unworthiness to be com- 
 pared with Christ, Sir Monier compares the two 
 constantly ; he does so in spite of himself, and all 
 Christians do so and cannot help doing so, because 
 the comparison forces itself upon every one who 
 familiarizes himself with the lives of these two 
 greatest religious leaders of mankind. 
 
 Professor Williams is undoubtedly anxious to be 
 just toward Buddha, but we cannot help taking him 
 to task for a certain animosity which is shown in 
 occasional distortions of the accounts of Buddha's 
 life and doctrines. Thus he says, when Buddha 
 preached to his disciples, his sermon " was addressed 
 to monks," while " that of Christ was addressed not 
 to monks but to suffering sinners " (p. 44), as if the 
 disciples of Christ were not in the same predica- 
 ment as the monks that followed Buddha; for 
 Christ's disciples, too, had forsaken their homes in 
 order to devote themselves exclusively to the salva- 
 tion of their souls. The term " monk " smacks of a 
 Koman Catholic institution that has become odious 
 in Protestant countries. On the other hand, the 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 287 
 
 word " sinner " expresses a self-humiliation popular 
 in certain Christian circles only, but offensive to 
 those who believe in the dignity of man. Albeit, 
 whether monks or sinners, both the disciples of Bud- 
 dha and Christ were salvation-seeking men. 
 
 An actual misrepresentation, prompted by an un- 
 conscious disdain for Buddha, lies in the following 
 passage : 
 
 *' The story is that Gautama died from eating too much 
 pork (or dried boar's flesh). As this is somewhat derogatory 
 to his dignity it is not likely to have been fabricated. A 
 fabrication, too, would scarcely make him guilty of the in- 
 consistency of saying ' Kill no living thing,' and yet setting 
 an example of eating flesh-meat." 
 
 The fact is that according to theMahaparinibbana 
 Sutta Buddha's last meal consisted of " dried boar's 
 food," which in later works was interpreted to mean 
 " dried boar's meat " ; but it is not impossible that 
 " boar's food " denotes some mushroom or root that 
 was eagerly eaten by pigs. Thus it is not quite cer- 
 tain that Buddha's last meal consisted of meat ; yet 
 we grant that Buddha ate meat. N^evertheless, there 
 is no report which states that Buddha ate " too 
 much," we are only told that the meat was not fit to 
 eat. Whatever " boar's food " may have meant 
 Buddha taught that salvation could not be obtained 
 by abstinence from meat alone but by purity of heart. 
 Professor Williams probably remembers the Ama- 
 gandha-sutta which sets forth that evil habits, wicked 
 deeds, and impure thoughts defile a man, but not the 
 
288 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 eating of flesh — a declaration seven times empha- 
 sized in the refrain of the verses 4-10. 
 
 Accordingly, there is no inconsistency in Buddha's 
 eating meat, yet as to the statement that Buddha 
 ate " too much,." we can only say that it is an unjus- 
 tifiable accusation which we confidently hope Pro- 
 fessor Williams will expunge from eventual future 
 editions of his book. Buddha probably often enough 
 ate disgusting food on his wanderings through the 
 country of Magadha, for he was not always the 
 guest of kings, but more often a recipient of the 
 hospitality of poor villagers — a fact which is not 
 only in itself probable, but is actually mentioned in 
 various Chinese accounts of Buddha's life, as, for 
 instance, in the Fo-Sho-Hing-Tsan-King. Consider- 
 ing the hot climate of India, too, it is not impro- 
 bable, that the meat Buddha ate for his last meal 
 was tainted. Such in fact is the report of the Maha- 
 parinibbana Sutta, lY., 19, where we read : 
 
 " Now the Blessed One addressed Chunda, the worker in 
 metals, and said : ' Whatever dried boar's flesh, Chunda, is 
 left over to thee, that bury in a hole. I see no one, Chunda, 
 on earth nor in Mara's domain, nor in the Brahma's heaven, no 
 one among Samanas and Brdmanas, among gods and men, by 
 whom, when he has eaten it, that food can be assimilated, 
 save by the Tatliagata. 
 
 '* ' Even so, Lord ! ' said Chunda, the worker in metals, in 
 assent, to the Blessed One. And whatever dried boar's flesh 
 remained over, that he buried in a hole." 
 
 In the face of death, and suffering from the pains 
 of the consequence of his last meal, Buddha reveals 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OP BUDDHISM. 289 
 
 a nobility of character, which shows that he was not 
 only great, but also amiable. When Buddha felt 
 that his end drew near, he said : 
 
 " Now it may happen, Ananda, that some one should stir 
 up remorse in Chunda, the smith, by saying, ' This is evil to 
 thee, Chunda, and loss to thee in that when the Tathagata 
 had eaten his last meal from thy provision, then he died. 
 Any such remorse, Ananda, in Chunda, the smith, should be 
 checked by saying, * This is good to thee, Chunda, and gain to 
 thee, in that when the Tathagata had eaten his last meal from 
 thy provision, then he died. . . . There has been laid up by 
 Chunda, the smith, a karma redounding to length of life, re- 
 dounding to good birth, redounding to good fortune, redound- 
 ing to good fame, redounding to the inheritance of heaven, 
 and of sovereign power.' In this way, Ananda, should be 
 checked any remorse in Chunda, the smith." 
 
 While Buddha rejected the idea of obtaining sal- 
 vation through abstinence from flesh food, he cer- 
 tainly did not encourage the slaughter of animals 
 for the sake of making food of them. Thus a great 
 number of Buddhists abstain from eating fish and 
 meat; but there are some Buddhists (I refer, for 
 instance, to the Shin-Shiu, the largest sect of Japan) 
 who do eat fish and flesh, and they are recognized 
 as good Buddhists as much as Lutherans may be 
 called good Christians. 
 
 There is no need of picking out all the passages 
 in Sir Monier Monier- Williams's book on Buddhism 
 which appear to be dictated by a partisan spirit 
 favoring a dogmatic conception of Christianity and 
 apt to prove offensive to the followers of Buddha. 
 I shall, therefore, limit my critical remarks to the 
 19 
 
290 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 last chapter of the book, entitled " Buddhism, con- 
 trasted with Christianity " (pp. 337-563). 
 
 Professor Williams says : " Christianit}^ is a reli- 
 gion, whereas Buddhism, at least in its earliest and 
 truest form, is no religion at all." And why not ? 
 Because 
 
 " A religion, in the proper sense of the word, must postulate 
 the existence of one living and true God of infinite power, 
 wisdom, and love, the Creator, Designer, and Preserver of 
 all things visible and invisible. It must also take for granted 
 the immortality of man's soul or spirit. . . . Starting from 
 these assumptions, it must satisfy four requisites : (1) it must 
 reveal the Creator, (2) it must reveal man to himself, (3) it 
 must reveal some method by which the finite creature may 
 communicate with the infinite Creator, (4) it must prove its 
 title to be called a religion by its regenerating effect on man's 
 nature." 
 
 We must add that Professor Williams apparently 
 understands by God and soul the traditional concep- 
 tions of dogmatic Christianity ; and his faith in God 
 and soul is a mere " postulate," for in the realm of 
 experience no trace can be found of either. Thus 
 our knowledge of both must be attributed to a special 
 and supernatural revelation. The word "reveal" 
 in the passage quoted is intended to be understood 
 in the narrow sense, as opposed to the revelations of 
 the senses and of science. 
 
 What a poor comfort is the belief in a postulated 
 and specially revealed God ! A postulated God is 
 distant and hidden — even to the sages of the most 
 enlightened pagans. We are informed that what 
 they, the "unaided^" know pf noble and elevating 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 291 
 
 truths is a mere natural product of their investiga- 
 tion ; it is at best what any scientist can discover by 
 the usual methods of scientific inquiry. Their God, 
 it appears, can only be the God of the Keligion of 
 Science, who is the divinity of existence, the eternal 
 condition of man's rationality, the standard of all 
 truth, and the authority of right and justice ; but 
 not a metaphysical ego-deity whose existence can 
 only be known by an act of special revelation. 
 
 We must add that, in our opinion, the God of dog- 
 matism is not the God of the Israelitic prophets, nor 
 of Paul, nor of Christ. The founders of Chris- 
 tianity were as broad as Socrates, as Lau-tsze, and 
 even as Buddha — though Buddha was the broadest 
 of all. They prolaimed no Quicunque ; the condi- 
 tion of salvation which they held out to the poor in 
 spirit resembled closely the Dharma of Buddha, but 
 not the Thirty -nine Articles of the Anglican Church, 
 nor the confession of faith of any other Christian 
 church. It would take too much space to reprint 
 any one of them, be it the Augustana of the Luther- 
 ans, or the Thirty-nine Articles of the Episcopalians, 
 or the Westminster Confession, or the decrees of the 
 Tridentinum, or a papal bull, perhaps the famous 
 bull of Innocence YIII., issued in 1484, which brought 
 the terrors of the witch persecutions down on 
 Europe.* 
 
 There is none of these but contains the most irra- 
 tional and even barbarous and immoral propositions 
 
 * The bull is known by its initial words : " Summis deside- 
 rantes affectibus,'' 
 
292 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHBISTIAN CBITICS. 
 
 proclaimed in the name of God and professing to be 
 the true and orthodox interpretation of God's revela- 
 tion. Compare any one with Buddha's Dharma, 
 which is briefly condensed in the famous stanza : 
 
 ' ' To abandon all wrong-doing, 
 To lead a virtuous life 
 And cleanse one's heart. 
 That is the religion of all Buddhas." 
 
 Buddha's religion is very much like that of Christ, 
 but it differs greatly from the Christianity of Chris- 
 tian dogmatism. Christ requests men to hsiWQ faith 
 (i. e., Hebrew amunah, firmness of character, or 
 Greek TrtVrr?, faithfulness or fidelity), which is a moral 
 quality implying steadfast confidence ; the churches 
 demand helief, i. e. taking something for granted. 
 We cannot live without faith, but we can very well 
 exist without belief, for we can be faithful in the 
 performance of our duties, the correctness of which 
 we may be able to know and understand. In fact, 
 whenever belief is necessary, it plays a mere tempo- 
 rary part, for we must strive with might and main 
 to replace it by knowledge. 
 
 Measured by the standard of Professor Williams's 
 religious ideal, (which, being the Christianity of 
 belief, not of faith, starts, as he expressly states it, 
 from " assumptions," and is based upon a " taking 
 for granted,") Buddhism is no religion at all. For, 
 says he of Buddhism : 
 
 "It failed to satisfy these conditions. It refused to admit 
 the existence of a personal Creator, or of man's dependence 
 on a higher Power. It denied any eternal soul or Ego in man. 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 293 
 
 It acknowledged no external, supernatural revelation. It had 
 no priesthood — no real clergy ; no real prayer ; no real worship. 
 It had no true idea of sin, or of the need of pardon, and it con- 
 demned man to suffer the consequences of his own sinful acts 
 without hope of help from any Saviour or Redeemer, and in- 
 deed from any being but himself." 
 
 Now, as I understand Buddhism, all these draw- 
 backs are its greatest glory ; and if there is any 
 truth in Christianity, Christianity also must possess 
 these very same features. 
 
 Professor Williams says on page 14 : 
 
 " Buddhism — with no God higher than the perfect man — 
 has no pretensions to be called a religion in the true sense of 
 the word." 
 
 Eemember that Christ was crucified on the charge 
 of blasphemy. If the dogmas of Christianity have 
 any meaning at all, they proclaim this central truth 
 of all genuine religion, that the Deity is revealed in 
 humanity ; God is nothing more nor less than those 
 eternal conditions of being which beget man — i. e., 
 the rational and morally aspiring being. Christ is 
 God's equal. God is the Father, Christ is the Son ; 
 and the Son and the Father are one. In a word, the 
 significance of Christianity is that God reveals him- 
 self in the perfect man. The ideal of human perfec- 
 tion is identical with true divinity. 
 
 Buddhism developed the idea of Amitabha Buddha, 
 personifying in him the omnipresent conditions of 
 enlightenment. There is no God higher than Bud- 
 dha, and there is nothing greater in God than that 
 which produces the ideal of a perfect man. 
 
294 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 But Buddhism denies the existence of " a soul or 
 ego." Yery well ! Did Christ ever teach that the soul 
 of man is his ego ? If the belief in an ego-soul were 
 one of the essential ingredients of " a religion in the 
 proper sense of the word," Christ should have enlight- 
 ened us about it. He did nothing of the kind, and 
 this being so, we must begin seriously to doubt 
 whether Christ ever taught a religion in the proper 
 sense of the word. Indeed if Buddha's doctrine of 
 the soul is nihilistic and pessimistic, we must say the 
 same of St. Paul, for he declares that he himself has 
 been crucified with Christ, and that not he himself, 
 i. e., Paul, liveth, but Christ liveth in him. 
 
 As to prayer we can only say that Christ did his 
 best to abolish " real prayer," (that is, prayer in the 
 sense of begging) by instituting for it the Lord's 
 prayer, which is no prayer in the proper sense of the 
 word. Christ said : " When thou pray est thou shalt 
 not be as the hypocrites are ; . . . when ye pray use 
 not vain repetitions as the heathen do, . . . your 
 father knoweth what things ye have need of, before 
 ye ask him." The Lord's prayer, accordingly, is a 
 prayer which contains no prayers whatever ; the 
 fourth supplication, "give us this day our daily 
 bread," appears as a request, but considered in the 
 context of the whole Sermon on the Mount, we find 
 that Christ emphasizes the word " this day," which 
 must be interpreted as nothing else than the injunc- 
 tion " Take no thought for the morrow ! " 
 
 The same is true of the fifth supplication, " For- 
 give us our trespasses, as we forgive those who tres- 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 295 
 
 pass against us." The burden of these words lies in 
 the clause introduced by " as," which again is no 
 prayer, but contains a vow. 
 
 The Lord's prayer is not so much addressed to 
 God who " knoweth what things we have need of," 
 but to the person who wants to pray. It is no beg- 
 ging, but a self -discipline. It satisfies a craving which 
 is natural in weak-hearted persons, in adult children, 
 but unworthy of a man. In the form of a prayer, 
 the Lord's prayer weans Christians of praying. It 
 teaches man no longer to pray, or to attempt to 
 change the will of God, but to change the will of 
 the praying person by saying "not my will but 
 God's will must be done." " Keal prayer" is a hea- 
 thenish notion implicating the heart in hypocrisy. 
 
 If there is any philosopher of weight who can be 
 called Christian it is Kant. Educated by pious par- 
 ents, and himself deeply religious, he preserved of 
 the faith of his childhood as much as possible ; and 
 hear what he says about prayer : 
 
 " To expect of prayer other than natural effects is foolish 
 and needs no explicit refutation. We can only ask, Is not 
 prayer to be retained for the sake of its natural effects? 
 Among the natural effects we count that the dark and con- 
 fused ideas present in the soul are either clarified through 
 prayer, or that they receive a higher degree of intensity ; that 
 the motives of a virtue receive greater efficacy, etc., etc. 
 
 *' We have to say that prayer can, for the reasons adduced, 
 be recommended only subjectively, for he who can in another 
 way attain to the effects for which prayer is recommended 
 will not be in need of it. 
 
 " A man may think, ' If I pray to God, it can hurt me in no 
 wise ; for should he not exist, very well ! in that case I have 
 
296 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 done too much of a good thing ; but if he does exist, it will 
 help me.' This Prosopopoeia (face-making) is hypocrisy, for 
 we have to presuppose in prayer that he who prays is firmly 
 convinced that God exists. 
 
 " The consequence of this is that he who has made great 
 moral progress ceases to pray, for honesty is one of his prin- 
 cipal maxims. And further, that those whom one surprises 
 in prayer are ashamed of themselves. 
 
 " In public sermons before the public, prayer must be re- 
 tained, because it can be rhetorically of great effect, and can 
 make a great impression. Moreover, in sermons before the 
 people one has to appeal to their sensuality, and must, as 
 much as possible, stoop down to them." 
 
 The Buddhist prayer is of the same nature as the 
 Lord's prayer, in the sense in which we conceive it 
 and as Kant would have interpreted its purport. It 
 is no longer a prayer in the proper sense of the 
 word; it is a vow. Like the Lord's prayer, the 
 Buddhist vows teach men to take refuge in religion, 
 and that is more than any " real prayer " can ask or 
 do for us. 
 
 Professor Williams says (p. 544), " the main idea 
 implied by Buddhism is intellectual enlightenment.'' 
 With all deference to Professor Williams's knowl- 
 edge of the significance of Buddhist doctrines, we 
 must beg him to omit the word "intellectual." 
 Buddha's idea of enlightenment " (in contradistinc- 
 tion to Christian dogmatism) certainly includes " in- 
 tellectual enlightenment," but it is first and last and 
 mainly an enlightenment of the heart. 
 
 Professor Williams says : 
 
 "What says our Bible? We Christians, it says, are mem- 
 bers of Christ's Body — of His flesh and of His bones— of that 
 
CHRISTIAN CEITICS OF BUDDHISM. 297 
 
 Divine Body which was once a suffering Body, a cross-bearing 
 Body, and is now a glorified Body, an ever-living, life-giving 
 Body. Hence it teaches us to honor and revere the human 
 body ; nay, almost to deify the human body. 
 
 " A Buddhist, on the other hand, treats every kind of body 
 with contempt, and repudiates as a simple impossibility, all 
 idea of being a member of the Buddha's body. How could a 
 Buddhist be a member of a body which was burnt to ashes — 
 which was calcined, — which became extinct at the moment 
 when the Buddha's whole personality became extinguished 
 also?" 
 
 Here we have a new Christology and a new Chris- 
 tian dogma which demands Christians " almost to 
 deify the human body." The passage to which Pro- 
 fessor Williams refers (I. Cor. vi., 15-20) cannot be 
 interpreted in the sense that Christians " are members 
 of Christ's body — of His flesh and of His bones." 
 For in that very passage we read : 
 
 " He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit." 
 
 Further says Paul : 
 
 *' O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the 
 body of this death." (Rom. vii. 24.) 
 
 The New Testament treats the body as forfeited 
 to death ; and there is certainly truth in this view, 
 although it has been wrongly interpreted in Chris- 
 tian asceticism and monkish morality. As to Bud- 
 dha, it is well known that while he did not seek the 
 pleasures of the body, he spurned asceticism as a 
 wrong method of seeking salvation. Whenever 
 Buddhists retained mortifications they did so in vio- 
 lation of the most unequivocal injunctions and of 
 the historically best assured traditions of Buddha's 
 
298 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 Dharma. As to " the Body of Buddha," Professor 
 Williams overlooks here the well-known Buddhist 
 doctrine that Buddha's body is the Dharma. When 
 Buddha died, his bodily life was dissolved into non- 
 existence, but not his doctrine. His individuality was 
 gone, but not the enlightenment of his Buddhahood. 
 We read in "The Book of the Great Decease" 
 (Chap. YI., 1) : 
 
 A 
 
 *' Now the Blessed One addressed the venerable Ananda, and 
 said : ' It may be, Luanda, that in some of you the thought 
 may arise, "The word of the Master is ended, we have no 
 teacher more ! " But it is not thus, Luanda, that you should 
 regard it. The truths and the rules of the order which I have 
 set forth and laid down for you all, let them, after I am gone, 
 be the Teacher to you.' " 
 
 Further Professor Williams says : 
 
 " The Buddha had no idea of sin as an offence against God 
 (p. 546). Nor did the Buddha ever claim to be a deliverer 
 from guilt, a purger from the taints of past pollution. . . . 
 On the contrary, by his doctrine of Karma he bound a man 
 hand and foot to the inevitable consequence of his own evil 
 actions with chains of adamant. He said, in effect, to every 
 one of his disciples, * You are in slavery to a tyrant of your 
 own setting up ; your own deeds, words, and thoughts in your 
 present and former states of being, are your own avengers 
 through a countless series of existences. 
 
 " * If you have been a murderer, a thief, a liar, impure, a 
 drunkard, you must pay the penalty in your next birth . . . 
 your doom is sealed. Not in the heavens, O man, not in the 
 midst of the sea, not if thou hidest thyself in the clefts of the 
 mountains, wilt thou find a place where thou canst escape 
 the force of thine own evil actions. Thy only hope of salva- 
 tion is in thyself. Neither god nor man can save thee, and I 
 am wholly powerless to set thee free.' " 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 299 
 
 Buddha teaches that the evil consequences of 
 error, sin, and wrongdoing cannot be escaped ; but 
 evil deeds can be covered by good deeds. The pas- 
 sage to which Professor Williams refers is incomplete 
 without its counter-truth, that good deeds, too, will 
 not fail to bear good fruits. Buddha teaches : 
 
 " As the welcome of kinsfolk and friends awaits him who 
 has been abroad and is now returning in safety : so the fruits 
 of his good works greet the man who has walked in the path 
 of righteousness when he passes over from the present life 
 into the hereafter." 
 
 To quote the one without the other would be the 
 same as if some one cited from the IN^ew Testament 
 the words, "He who does not believe shall be 
 damned," and forgets to add the counter proposi- 
 tion, " He who believes shall be saved." 
 
 In Professor Williams's opinion, Christianity is 
 superior to Buddhism, because it is said actually to 
 relieve the believer from the consequences of sin. 
 He continues : 
 
 "And now, contrast the few brief words of Christ in his 
 first recorded sermon. ' The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, 
 because He hath anointed Me to preach good tidings to the 
 poor ; He hath sent Me to proclaim liberty to the captives, and 
 recovering of sight to the blind, and the opening of the prison 
 to them that are bound.' " 
 
 Buddha would never have said, " the Spirit of the 
 Lord is upon me," (which is a peculiarly Hebrew 
 expression), and it is very improbable that Christ 
 would ever have thought of saying anything like it. 
 
300 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 As to the substance of this proclamation, Professor 
 Williams will be aware that both Buddha and 
 Christ promised to give liberty to the captives, the 
 recovery of sight to the blind, and the faculty of 
 comprehension to the deaf. 
 Professor Williams sums up : 
 
 " Yes, in Christ alone there is deliverance from the bondage 
 of former transgressions, from the prison-house of former 
 sins ; a total cancelling of the past ; a complete blotting-out 
 of the handwriting that is against us ; an entire washing away 
 of every guilty stain ; the opening of a clear course for every 
 man to start afresh ; the free gift of pardon and of life to 
 every criminal, to every sinner — even the most heinous and 
 inveterate." 
 
 Captain C. Pfoundes, a resident of Japan, who 
 has made a study of Japanese Buddhism, says on 
 the subject of the doctrine of atonement, viewing it 
 from a purely practical standpoint : 
 
 "It is all too true, and more the pity it is that it is so, 
 that the converts (nominal) to Christianity are largely natives 
 whose conduct is such that by the general opinion of foreign res- 
 idents such converts are not the most desirable class to employ. 
 The true Buddhist has ever in mind the fear of punishment 
 hereafter for misdeeds, not to be lightly atoned for. 'The 
 naughty little boy who is always ready to say he "is sorry," if 
 he is assured that this will obtain forgiveness,' has no counter 
 part in true Buddhism ; and the too easily purchased pardon of 
 Christian mission teaching is viewed as a danger, from the 
 ethical standpoint, by the educated and intelligent Asiatic." 
 
 If the essence of Christianity consists in the hope 
 of an entire washing away of every guilty stain and 
 getting rid of the consequences of our evil deeds, we 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 301 
 
 can only hope that the civilized nations of mankind 
 will abandon Christianity. Buddha's doctine is cer- 
 tainly grander and, what is more, truer than this 
 hollow doctrine of a salvation of the guilty by the 
 death of the innocent. Buddha, when speaking of 
 sacrifices, rejected the idea that blood can wash away 
 sins, and when he regarded himself as the saviour 
 of man, he meant that he was their teacher. He 
 claimed to have pointed out the way of salvation 
 and to have removed the cataract from the eyes of 
 the blind, but he expects every one of his followers 
 to exert himself when walking on the path. 
 
 A man converted from sin is saved in the sense 
 that henceforth he will walk in the right direction ; 
 his character is changed ; he turns over a new leaf, 
 but he cannot annihilate the past and the conse- 
 quences of his former karma. 
 
 The dogma of the vicarious atonement through 
 Christ's death is a survival of the age of barbarism ; 
 for it is based upon the savage's idea of religion 
 which represents God as an Apache chieftain who, 
 when offended, thirsts for the death of somebody 
 and must be pacified with blood. 
 
 He who believes it necessary to " postulate " the 
 existence of a metaphysical atman-God in addition 
 to the real God whose presence appears in the facts 
 of experience, and of a purusha-soul in addition to 
 the psychic realities of our life, will naturally regard 
 the extinction of the illusion of "the thought '/ 
 ajn^^ " (i. e., the error of the existence of an individ- 
 ual ego-self) and of an individual God-being, as 
 
302 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 dreary nihilism and " morbid pessimism." Professor 
 Williams says : 
 
 ** What is Buddhism ? If it were possible to reply to the in- 
 quiry in one word, one might perhaps say that true Buddhism, 
 theoretically stated, is Humanitarianism, meaning by that 
 term something very like the gospel of humanity preached by 
 the Positivist, whose doctrine is the elevation of man through 
 man — that is, through human intellects, human intuitions, 
 human teaching, human experiences, and accumulated human 
 efforts — to the highest ideal of perfection ; and yet something 
 very different. For the Buddhist ideal differs toto ccelo from 
 the Positivist's, and consists in the renunciation of all personal 
 existence, even to the extinction of humanity itself. The 
 Buddhist's perfection is destruction." 
 
 The Buddhist perfection consists in the complete 
 surrender of the illusion of an ego-self ; and Profes- 
 sor Williams meant to say that the Buddhist's per- 
 fection should, from his standpoint of a believer in 
 an ego-self, be regarded as tantamount to destruc- 
 tion ; for he knows very well, and happily says it 
 too, that it is not so. But so little does Professor 
 Williams understand the positivism of Buddha's 
 doctrine, that he regards Buddha as inconsistent, 
 because, instead of proclaiming the ideal of destruc- 
 tion, or surrendering himself to quietism, Buddha 
 rouses himself and his followers to energetic work 
 and sympathetic usefulness. 
 
 Professor Williams says : 
 
 *' In fact it was characteristic of a supreme Buddha that he 
 should belie, by his own activity and compassionate feelings, 
 the utter apathy and indifference to which his own doctrines 
 logically led," 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 303 
 
 According to my comprehension of Buddhism, 
 Buddha need not in his ethics helie his own doctrines ; 
 for his ethics are an immediate consequence of his 
 doctrines. Should not Professor "Williams first sus- 
 pect his conception of Buddhism, before he imputes 
 to so profound and clear a thinker, as Buddha un- 
 questionably was, a gross inconsistency on the main 
 issues of his religion ? 
 
 A few days ago I received a booklet entitled Hap- 
 piness, which is a comparison of Christianity with 
 Buddhism from a Buddhist standpoint. It is osten- 
 sibly written by a Buddhist who presents a friend 
 and co-religionist with the impressions he receives 
 during a sojourn in England. In spite of its crude 
 make-up the booklet is cleverly designed and makes 
 some good points which are decided hits on a literal 
 belief in dogmatic Christianity. Salvation is defined 
 by this Buddhist author as " The destruction of ego 
 or of the misery of existence." He adds : " I find 
 that they [the Christians] always think we mean 
 the destruction of existence itself and not of the 
 misery." Concerning the Christian idea of salvation 
 he says : " They imagine they go to their heaven, 
 ego and all : throwing their blackest sins on the 
 shoulders of their God." 
 
 The Buddhist and Christian conceptions of reli- 
 gion are contrasted as follows : 
 
 '• Ours. Destruction of Ego by knowledge, gratitude, and 
 love ; the practice of which is intense happiness. 
 
 " Theirs is more the worship of God^ chiefly for the forgive- 
 ness of sin, as if such forgiveness were possible, without suffer- 
 ing ; whilst ours is the destruction of the evil itself," 
 
304 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 When speaking about the doctrine of atonement, 
 our Buddhist author says : 
 
 "This strange idea arises I think from their notion of a 
 despotic and capricious God, who forgives or condemns in a 
 moment without reason, yet, at the same time, with this un- 
 merciful God there is no forgiveness — the debt of sin must he 
 paid with innocent blood, though it involve the sacrifice of his 
 own innocent son." 
 
 Several paragraphs are devoted to prayer which 
 with Buddhists is " contemplation and self-examina- 
 tion." Speaking of the Lord's prayer our Buddhist 
 critic says : 
 
 " You would think Him [the God of the Christians] an in- 
 competent being, when they set Him a good example — ' For- 
 give us . . . as we forgive.' But if He followed their 
 example He would rarely forgive them. 
 
 " Again, you would say they were praying to some evil 
 spirit, when they beg him not to lead them into temptation." 
 
 The Buddhist and Christian conceptions of Hell 
 are tersely condensed in these statements : 
 
 " Ours. The effect of obedience to Ego, here and hereafter, 
 while it lasts. 
 
 ' ' Their Hell is like their Heaven, a place— not a state — where 
 the identical earthly bodies of nearly all humanity will be 
 tormented in actual fire for ever ; to no purpose, except to 
 satisfy the vindictiveness of their Creator, whom they call 
 the ' God of Love.' 
 
 *'They do not see that it is the Ego that tortures, and not 
 Ood; that he cannot torture, and has no Hell" 
 
 These quotations show how easily a religion is 
 misrepresented, but we are sorry to say that the 
 
CHRISTIAN CRITICS OF BUDDHISM. 305 
 
 great mass of Christians justify the above criticism 
 by actually believing in the letter of their dogmas. 
 We trust that there is a nobler Christianity than 
 Christian dogmatism, but Sir Monier Monier- Wil- 
 liams regards the belief in the atonement of sin by 
 the innocent blood of Christ, the efficacy of real 
 prayer, the reality of an ego-soul, and the existence 
 of a personal and miracle-working God-Creator, as 
 the essence of Christianity. 
 
 In a summary of his comparison of Christianity 
 with Buddhism, Professor Williams says : 
 
 " Buddhism, I repeat, says : Act righteously through your 
 own efforts, and for the final getting rid of all suffering, of all 
 individuality, of all life in yourselves. Christianity says : Be 
 righteous through a power implanted in you from above, 
 through the power of a life-giving principle, freely given to 
 you, and always abiding in you. The Buddha said to his fol- 
 lowers: 'Take nothing from me, trust to yourselves alone.' 
 Christ said : ' Take all from Me ; trust not to yourselves. I 
 give unto you eternal life, I give unto you the bread of heaven, 
 I give unto you living water.' Not that these priceless gifts 
 involve any passive condition of inaction. On the contrary, 
 they stir the soul of the recipient with a living energy. They 
 stimulate him to noble deeds and self-sacrificing efforts. They 
 compel him to act as the worthy, grateful, and appreciative 
 possessor of so inestimable a treasure. 
 
 " Still, I seem to hear some one say : We acknowledge this ; 
 we admit the truth of what you have stated ; nevertheless, 
 for all that, you must allow that Buddhism conferred a great 
 benefit on India by encouraging freedom of thought and by 
 setting at liberty its teeming population, before entangled in 
 the meshes of ceremonial observances and Brahmanical priest- 
 craft. 
 
 "Yes, I grant this: nay, I grant even more than this. I 
 admit that Buddhism conferred many other benefits on the 
 ?9 
 
306 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CRITICS. 
 
 millions inhabiting the most populous part of Asia. It intro- 
 duced education and culture; it encouraged literature and 
 art ; it promoted physical, moral, and intellectual progress up 
 to a certain point ; it proclaimed peace, good will, and brother- 
 hood among men ; it deprecated war between nation and 
 nation ; it avowed sympathy with social liberty and freedom ; 
 it gave back much independence to women ; it preached 
 purity in thought, word, and deed (though only for the accu- 
 mulation of merit) ; it taught self-denial without self-torture ; 
 it inculcated generosity, charity, tolerance, love, self-sacrifice, 
 and benevolence, even towards the inferior animals ; it ad- 
 vocated respect for life and compassion towards all creatures ; 
 it forbade avarice and the hoarding of money ; and from its 
 declaration that a man's future depended on his present acts 
 and condition, it did good service for a time in preventing 
 stagnation, stimulating exertion, promoting good works of all 
 kinds, and elevating the character of humanity." 
 
 If Prof essor Williams's conception of Christianity 
 must be accepted as true Christianity, Christianity 
 will pass away to make room for Buddhism. Hap- 
 pily, Christianity is a living religion, that, having 
 passed through the stage of metaphysical dogma- 
 tism, is still possessed of the power of regeneration, 
 so as to approach more and more — though progress 
 is sometimes slow — the ideal of a genuine catho- 
 licity. Those features which Professor Williams 
 regards as the essential grandeur of Christianity, 
 are a most serious defect; and their absence in 
 Buddhism indicates that it is the more advanced 
 religion. That religion only which has overcome 
 the pagan notions of a special revelation, of atone- 
 ment through blood, of wiping out the past, of the 
 miraculous power of prayer, of the ego-conscious- 
 ness as a kind of thing-in-itself, and of a creation 
 
CHRISTIAN CEITICS OP BUDDHISM. 307 
 
 out of nothing by a God-magician, can eventually 
 become the religion of mankind. 
 
 For myself, I must confess that I never felt more 
 like a true Buddhist than after a perusal of Pro- 
 fessor Williams's description of Buddhism ; for I 
 am now more firmly convinced than ever, that our 
 Church-Christianity can only become a scientifically 
 true and logically sound religion of cosmic and uni- 
 versal significance, by being transformed into that 
 Buddhism which Professor "Williams refuses to 
 regard "as a religion in the proper sense of the 
 word." 
 
 Did you never read in the Scriptures, " The stone 
 which the builders rejected, the same has become 
 the head of the comer " ? 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 Buddha's religion appears valuable for three rea- 
 sons. 
 
 1. It is the religion of enlightenmen t. Buddha's 
 principle of acquiring truth is to rely upon the best 
 and most accurate methods man can find for inves- 
 tigating the truth. In his dying hour he urged his 
 disciples to rely upon their own efforts in finding the 
 truth, not upon the Yedas, not upon the authority 
 of others, not even upon Buddha himself, and he 
 added : " Hold fast to the truth as a lamp." 
 
 2. Buddha anticipated even in important details the 
 results of a scientific soul-conceptio n. He rejected 
 the Brahman theory of soul-migration and explained 
 man's continuance beyond death as a rebirth or re- 
 incarnation, a reappearance of the same soul-form. 
 This is based on the doctrine that man's psychic 
 nature is not a substance or entity, not an atman 
 or self, but consists of karma ; it is the product of 
 deeds, a form of activity conditioned by the pre- 
 servation or transference of the memory of former 
 actions. J^or did Buddha shun the unpopularity to 
 which his message to the world was exposed, be- 
 
 308 
 
CONCLUSION. 309 
 
 cause liable to be misrepresented as a " psychology 
 without a soul." 
 
 3. While he was bold and outspoken in his nega- 
 tion, he proclaimed at the same time, the posit ive 
 
 PrvngP^lf^nnPS nf hiR philoRophy — Thft negation of 
 
 the atman-soul shows the vanity of man's hankering 
 after enjoyment, be it in this world or in a heaven 
 beyond, and Buddha taught that by cutting off the 
 yearning for a heaven in any form, be it on earth 
 or beyond the clouds, man will annihilate those con- 
 ditions which produce the hell of life. When the 
 idea of an independent self is done away with, when 
 we understand that man's character is the form of 
 his being as shaped by, and finding expression in, 
 deeds, and finally, when we learn that according to 
 our deeds this form continues in the further develop- 
 ment of life, bearing fruit according to the nature 
 of our deeds, the irrationality of all hatred, envy, 
 and malevolence becomes apparent, and room is left 
 only for the aspirations of an unbounded and helpful 
 
 sympathy with all evolution of life. ^ 
 
 Buddha is, so far as we know, the first prophet \ 
 who proclaimed the paramount importance of mo- 
 rality in religion. At the same time he is the first 
 positivist, the first humanitarian, the first radical 
 freethinker, the first iconoclast, and the first prophet ^^ 
 of the Religion of Science. The more we become 
 acquainted with the original writings of Buddhism, 
 the more are we impressed with the greatness of 
 Buddha's far-seeing comprehension of both the 
 problems of religion and psychology. To be sure, 
 
310 BUDDHISM AND ITS CHRISTIAN CKITICS. 
 
 he had not the same scientific material at his dis- 
 posal that we have to-day, but the fundamental 
 problems in philosophy, psychology, and religion, 
 are much simpler than our philosophers would make 
 us believe. Buddha saw in great outlines the solu- 
 tion of the religious problem, and pronounced boldly 
 a religion which stood in contradiction to all that 
 which by Brahmans was considered as most essential 
 to religion. In a word, he pronounced a religion 
 
 I based upon facts which should replace a religion 
 
 j b^ed upon the assumptions of belief. 
 
 Many Buddhist doctrines, especially some of 
 the most salient moral maxims, have reappeared in 
 Christianity, where they assumed a less abstract and 
 more concrete shape, so as to appeal more directly 
 to the energetic races of the North. 
 /ODhristianity has been to Europe what Buddhism 
 has been to Asia, and the analogies in the history 
 of both religions, especially the evolution of sects, 
 the development of ritual and religious art, and the 
 various deviations finding expression in superstitious 
 practices, priestly pretensions, and dogmatic vaga- 
 ries, are most interesting and instructive. 
 
 / ' For the sake of purifying our conception of religion, 
 
 ' there is no better method than a study of com- 
 parative religion ; and in comparative religion there 
 is nothing more fruitful than a tracing of the analo- 
 gies and contrasts that obtain between Buddhism 
 and Christianity. 
 
 1 P' 
 
INDEX. 
 
 A. 
 
 Abhidharma, The, 196. 
 
 Action and non-action, 158. 
 
 Adrishta, 16. 
 
 Advaita, 16, 93. 
 
 ^sopean fables, 206. 
 
 Akamatsu, A., 278. 
 
 America, 125. 
 
 Amida, 200. 
 
 Amita, 34. 
 
 Amitabha, 268. 
 
 Ananda, 42, 67, 289. 
 
 Annihilation, 53, 65, 76, 79, 159. 
 
 Antiochus, 202, 203. 
 
 Apavarga, 20. 
 
 Apollonius of Tyana, 225, 226. 
 
 Apollos, 225. 
 
 Arhat, 149. 
 
 Ariovistus, 218. 
 
 Art. Buddhistic, 198. 
 
 Arupam, 50, 55. 
 
 Arupo, 49. 
 
 Asceticism, 21, 24, 222. 
 
 Ashoka, 263; his rock inscrip- 
 tions, 201. 
 
 Ashvaghosha, 174, footnote ; 
 176, footnote ; 177, footnote ; 
 179, footnote ; 180, footnote ; 
 181, footnote ; 183, 184 ; 194, 
 footnote. 
 
 Asita, 174. 
 
 Astral body, 25. 
 
 Atheism, 30, 196, 197. 
 
 Atman, 25, 42, 44, 45, 46, 52, 84, 
 97, 100, 128, 132, 160. 
 
 Atman-God, 301. 
 
 B. 
 
 Baptism, 193, 194. 
 
 Beal, Prof. Samuel, 201, 202. 
 
 Belief, 292. 
 
 Belligerent spirit, 192. 
 
 Benfey, 129. 
 
 Bhagavadgita, 94. 
 
 Bhikshu, 259. 
 
 Bhikshuni, 259. 
 
 Bigandet, Bishop, 166. 
 
 Bliss not happiness, 7 ; surrender 
 
 of self is, 110. 
 Bodhi, 48. 
 Body, 39, 297. 
 Bohme, 121. 
 Boniface, 239. 
 Brahma, 14, 29. 
 Brahmanism, 14. 
 Brahmans, 180. 
 Buddha the moral law, 79 ; his 
 
 personality, 54 ; also, 115. 
 Buddhaghosa, 35, footnote ; 45, 
 
 51, 171. 
 Buddhaghosa' s Parables, 183. 
 Buddhism teaches a belief in 
 
 God, 196. 
 Biihler, 204. 
 
 C. 
 
 Cana, marriage at, 178. 
 Candlin, Rev. George T., 248. 
 Catholic, 235. 
 Ceylon, 244. 
 Chandragupta, 202. 
 Changes, 228. 
 
 311 
 
312 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Charvakas, 18. 
 
 Che, 252. 
 
 Childers, 147, 148, 149. 
 
 Chinese placard, 250. 
 
 Christ, 48, 107, 115. 
 
 Christianity, strength of, 8; 
 advantages of, 6 ; Pre-Chris- 
 tian, 225. 
 
 Christians, 144. 
 
 Christmas, 240. 
 
 Chunda, 288, 289. 
 
 Church, 192. 
 
 Clifford, 132. 
 
 Columbus, 125. 
 
 Comforter, 187. 
 
 Comparative religion, 811. 
 
 Comte, August, 99. 
 
 Confucius, 249, 262, 271, 272. 
 
 Cowell, E. B., 177, footnote. 
 
 D. 
 
 Darsanas, 15. 
 
 Davids, Rhys, 27, footnote ; 35, 
 footnote; 138. 139, 140, 141, 
 142, 147, 165, 195, 206. 
 
 Death, 26, 42. 
 
 Deathless, 46, 49, 56. 
 
 Deliverance, 21. 
 
 De Rerum Natura, 97, footnote. 
 
 Devadatta, 274. 
 
 Dhammapada, 135, 136, 153, 163. 
 
 Dharraa, 38. 
 
 Dharmapala, 60. 
 
 Dharmaraja, 173, 208. 
 
 Disciples, 225. 
 
 Doketistic heresy, 194. 
 
 Don Quixote, 33. 
 
 Du Bose, Rev. Hampden C, 166, 
 245, 247. 
 
 Dust, 161. 
 
 E. 
 
 Ecee ego, 115. 
 
 Ego, 66, 67, 73, 294. 
 
 Egocentric psychology, 64. 
 
 Ego-illusion, 101, 109. 
 
 Ego-soul, 58, 131. 
 
 Eightfold path, 35, 37, 77, 81. 
 
 Empire of Truth, 37. 
 
 Enlightenment, 27, 48, 77, 149, 
 
 308. 
 Essene movement, 208. 
 Essenes, 215, 219, 220. 
 Evil, problem of, 13; root of, 
 
 24,27. 
 Evolution, 25, 63,64 ; in religion, 
 
 226. 
 
 Fable, 212. 
 Faust, 108, 122, 277. 
 Fig-tree, 185. 
 Forms-in-themselves, 51. 
 
 G. 
 
 Gabet, 167. 
 
 Garbe, 220. 
 
 Gassner, 261. 
 
 Gauss, 71. 
 
 Gautama Siddh^rtha, 23, 25, 28, 
 
 41, 150, 207, 226, 227, 283. 
 Geocentric astronomy, 64. 
 Gladstone, 96. 
 Gnosticism, 220. 
 God, 89, 111, 112, 170, 197, 293; 
 
 Buddhism teaches a belief 
 
 in, 196. 
 God-incarnation, 78. 
 God-man, 78. 
 
 Goethe, 56, 98-115, 119, 277. 
 Gondoforus, 201. 
 Gospel, 173. 
 Grace, time of, 174. 
 Gregory the Great, 238, 239. 
 Guest, 161. 
 Gunas, 21. 
 Gutzlaff, Charles, 271, 272, 273, 
 
 274, 275, 276. 
 
 Halley, 124, 125. 
 Hardwood, parable of the, 82. 
 Hardy, R. Spence, 263, 264, 265, 
 267, 268, 269, 270, 279. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 313 
 
 Heaven, 8, 78, 155. 
 
 Hegeler, 58. 
 
 Hell, 304. 
 
 Herod's massacre, 173. 
 
 Hinayana, 146, 230, 231, 232, 233, 
 
 236. 
 Hooke, 123, 124, 125. 
 Hue, 130, 167. 
 Humanitarianism, 302. 
 
 I, 86, 87, 101, 102. 
 Idolatry, 244. 
 Illegitimate questions, 41. 
 Illusion, 302 ; of self, 163. 
 Immortality, 27, 96, 107, 127. 
 Inward light, the, 122. 
 Irreligious, Buddha, not, 29. 
 Irony, 32. 
 Isaiah, 171, 207. 
 Ishvara, 29, 95, 195, 196. 
 
 Jain sect, 22. 
 
 Jainism, 226. 
 
 Jataka, 74. 
 
 Jesus Christ, 44, 261, 262. 
 
 Jnyataputra, 226. 
 
 John the Baptist, 178, 185. 
 
 Judgment of Solomon, 213. 
 
 Justinus Martyr, 215 ; footnote. 
 
 K. 
 
 Kandda, 16. 
 
 Kant, 58, 295, 296 ; his thing-in- 
 
 itself, 93. 
 Kapila, 20, 21, 24, 25. 
 Kapilavastu, 23. 
 Karma, 19, 26, 45, 46, 93, 100, 
 
 102, 104, 105, 131, 134, 138, 
 
 139, 141, 142, 143, 144, 163, 
 
 298, 301, 308. 
 Khayyam, Omar, 118, 119. 
 Kingdom of righteousness, 34, 
 
 176. 
 
 Kisa Gotaml, 175, 206. 
 Kouan-yin, 199. 
 Krishna, 172, 180. 
 
 Lassen, 220. 
 Latitudinarianism, 228. 
 Lau-tsze, 154, 216, 218, 221, 247. 
 
 271, 272, 291. 
 Lavater, 261. 
 Leo the Great, 240. 
 Letter, Oldenberg's, 72. 
 Lillie, Arthur, 169. 
 Living waters, 181. 
 Logos, 209 ; footnote. 
 Lokayatas, 18. 
 Luther, 41, 44 ; footnote. 
 
 M. 
 
 Magi, 174. 
 
 Mahaparinibbdna, 147. 
 Mahasetu, 233, 236. 
 Mahayana, 146, 230, 231, 232,233, 
 
 236. 
 Maitreya, 187, 195, 198, 207. 
 Man is a compound, 51. 
 Manas, 16. 
 Manitoo, 229. 
 Mara, 38, 49, 56. 
 Marriage at Cana, 178. 
 Mary, 173, 175, 199. 
 Matter, 20, 21. 
 Maya, 48. 
 Meadows, 272. 
 Melioristic morality, 224. 
 Middle path, 24, 36, 51, 52, 178. 
 Migration, 73. 
 Mind, makes or mars, 223. 
 Mind-stuff, 132. 
 Miracles, 177. 
 Missionaries, 6, 9, 130, 156, 166, 
 
 167, 168, 240, 241, 242, 244, 
 
 247. 
 Missionary hymn, 243. 
 Missions, advantage of, 10, 237. 
 
314 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Modem psychology, 57, 62, 96, 
 
 104. 
 Mohammed, 249, 262. 
 Monism, 14, 93. 
 Monks, 193. 
 MuUer, F. Max, 30, 33, 136, 147, 
 
 195,209,211,212,214,271. 
 Murder of parents, 189. 
 
 N. 
 
 Napoleon, 116, 117, 118. 
 
 Neo-Platonism, 220, 222. 
 
 Nestorian rituals, 169. 
 
 Neumann, 82 ; footnote. 
 
 Newton, 123, 126. 
 
 Nibbana, 148, 175. 
 
 Nicodemus, 181. 
 
 Night of Asia, 247. 
 
 Nihilism, 59. 
 
 Nirvana, 8, 19, 22, 28, 35, 36, 49, 
 50, 53, 54, 56, 65, 75, 77, 79, 
 81, 82, 109, 112, 145, 146, 
 147, 148, 149, 152, 154, 155, 
 156, 157, 160, 161, 163, 181, 
 282. 
 
 Nominalism, 52. 
 
 Non-resistance, 191. 
 
 Nothing, 218. 
 
 Nothingness, 49, 119. 
 
 Nyana, 16, 17. 
 
 O. 
 
 Oldenberg, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 
 65, 66, 67, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 
 75, 81, 82, 134, 137, 162. 
 
 Omar Khayyam, 118, 119. 
 
 O-mi-to-fu, 260, 275. 
 
 Orthodox, 235. 
 
 Pali, Siamese, 274. 
 Pantism, 16. 
 Pantscha Tantra, 129. 
 
 Parables, 8. 
 
 Parents, murder of, 189. 
 
 Parinibbana, 147. 
 
 Passerat, 218. 
 
 Permanent state, 161. 
 
 Personality, Buddha's, 54. 
 
 Perusha, 16, 19. 
 
 Perusha-soul, 301. 
 
 Pessimism, 162. 
 
 Pfoundes, Captain C, 800. 
 
 Pharisees, 180. 
 
 Philo, 220. 
 
 Philostratus, 226. 
 
 Pilate, 173. 
 
 Plato, 47, 48, 222. 
 
 Plotinus, 220. 
 
 Porphyry, 220. 
 
 Postulates, 84, 95. 
 
 Prajapati, 86, 88, 91, 220. 
 
 Prayer, The Lord's, 294, 295, 
 
 296, 304. 
 Pre-Christian Christianity, 225. 
 Protestantism, 33. 
 Pseudo-Matthew, 175. 
 Psychology, modern, 57, 62, 104. 
 Pure form, 47. 
 Pythagoras, 48. 
 
 R. 
 
 Ramanuja, 95. 
 
 Realism, 52. 
 
 Rebirth, 26, 42, 46, 73, 75, 308. 
 
 Red Sea, crossing the, 194. 
 
 Religion of Science, 113, 309. 
 
 Repetition of prayers, 260. 
 
 Rerum Natura, De, 97, footnote. 
 
 Rest, 161. 
 
 Righteousness, kingdom of, 34, 
 
 176. 
 Romanism, 166. 
 Rupa, 48. 
 
 S. 
 
 Sadducees, 106. 
 
 Salt, like the, 182. 
 
 Samkhya, 17, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 
 
 92, 219, 221, 222. 
 SamsAra, 19, 50. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 315 
 
 Samskaras, 36, 134. 
 
 Sangha, 192. 
 
 SankhAras, 62, 63, 74, 76, 79. 
 
 Schiller, 47, 48. 
 
 Schlagintweit, 156, 157. 
 
 Schopenhauer, 125, 135, 282. 
 
 Science, 10, 265, 268. 
 
 Self, 85-97, 128, 136, 138; cul- 
 ture of, 137 ; extinction of, 
 146 ; illusion of, 27 ; is bliss, 
 surrender of, 110 ; resigna- 
 tion of, 115 ; sacrifice of, 
 186 ; surrender of, 234 ; van- 
 ity of, 45. 
 
 Selfhood, 28, 121, 234. 
 
 Seydel, Rudolf, 169. 
 
 Shakyamuni, 59, 138, 141. 
 
 Shakya-simha, 173. 
 
 Shankara, 92, 94, 95. 
 
 Shariputra, 53. 
 
 Shinshiu, 33, 289. 
 
 Simeon, 174. 
 
 Similarities, 167, 171, 228. 
 
 Sola fide, 277. 
 
 Solomon, judgment of, 213. 
 
 Soul, 25, 58, 61, 62, 97, 134, 170. 
 
 Soul-form, 75. 
 
 Soul or mind, 133. 
 
 Source of all evil, 21. 
 
 St. Augustine, 233. 
 
 St. John, 171. 
 
 St. Josaphat, 195, 212. 
 
 St. Paul, 40, 55, 145, 194, 215, 
 footnote, 220, 224, 238, 276. 
 
 St. Peter, 177. 
 
 Strauss, D. Fr., 283. 
 
 Strength of Christianity, 8. 
 
 Struggle, ethics of, 9. 
 
 Suffering. 19. 
 
 Suffering One, The, 7. 
 
 Suicide, 81. 
 
 Supernatural, The, 228. 
 
 Surrender of self is bliss,110,234. 
 
 Survival of the fittest, 11. 
 
 Tanaka, K., 
 
 Tat twam asi, 135. 
 Tathdgata, 35. 
 Tau, 217, 272. 
 Tau-Teh-King, 154. 
 Tauler, 121, 145. 
 "Tee," 167. 
 Theism, 17. 
 Therapeutae, 220. 
 Thing-in-itself , 58, 59, 93. 
 Thomas, Adolph, 279, 283. 
 Thorwaldsen, 199. 
 Transmigration, 19, 26, 139. 
 Trikaya, 196, 209. 
 Trinity, 197, 199, 209. 
 Truth, 10, 28, 37. 
 Truths are real, 80. 
 Truth, Empire of, 37. 
 Tsang-tsze, 272. 
 Tusita Heaven, 48, 
 
 U. 
 
 Unification, 96, 103, 266, 279. 
 
 Upaka, 27. 
 
 Upanishads, 84, 89, 91, 96. 
 
 V. 
 
 Vacchagotta, 64, 66, 67, 68, 70. 
 Vaisheshika, 16. 
 Vardhamana, 22. 
 Vedanta, 15, 92. 
 Vedas, 15, 23, 29, 308. 
 Voigt, G.,276, 277, 278. 
 Vrihaspati, 18. 
 
 W. 
 
 Warren, H. C, 40, footnote ; 41, 
 footnote ; 50, footnote ; 171, 
 footnote; 172. 
 
 Weber, 220. 
 
 Wheel of becoming, 187. 
 
 Williams, Sir Monier Monier, 
 14, footnote ; 165, footnote ; 
 284, 285, 286, 287, 288, 289, 
 290, 292, 293, 296, 297, 298, 
 299, 300, 302, 303, 305, 806, 
 307. 
 
316 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Wind, 182. 
 Winfrid, 239. 
 World-flight, 7, 
 Wound, 55. 
 
 Yamaka, 53, 65. 
 Yashas, 181. 
 
 Yoga, 18, 24. 
 Yuletide, 240. 
 
 Z. 
 
 Zarathushtra,215, footnote. (See 
 
 Zoroaster.) 
 Zenith, 229. 
 Zoroaster, 249, 262. (See Zara- 
 
 thushtra.) 
 
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