CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE. 



faith as we have indicated should here and there 

 be found as the esoteric speculation of philos- 

 ophers, would not be very surprising. Such a 

 faith, however, is Buddhism, the creed of 480 

 millions of men, more than a third of the human 

 race ; the faith which, were truth to be decided 

 by majorities, would bear the palm from all the 

 religions of the world. The study of such a re- 

 ligion may be expected to abound in puzzles, in 

 conceptions which, to the European mind, are so 

 strange as to be well-nigh unintelligible. 



The great Eastern Peninsula, including Burmah, 

 .Siam, and the adjacent countries, Ceylon, China, 

 Japan, Tibet, Central Asia, and Northern Asia, 

 are the regions in which Buddhism now finds its 

 worshippers. More than half of the immense 

 population of China consists of its professed ad- 

 herents. It has a considerable hold upon Japan. 

 In the other countries named it reigns supreme. 

 In Northern Asia, it is found as far west as the 

 Volga, and it even extends into Lapland. From 

 Hindustan, the land of its origin, it has almost 

 disappeared, lingering only among the Nepaulese 

 and some other northern tribes. Wide-spread as 

 it is, our authentic knowledge of it is of recent 

 date. Up to 1844, the most diverse opinions were 

 entertained in Europe as to its nature and the 

 date and place of its origin. It was the publication 

 in that year of M. Eugene Bournouf 's Introduction 

 to the History of Buddhism that first supplied 

 trustworthy information as to its history and doc- 

 trines. M. Bournouf's work was founded upon a 

 collection of Sanscrit writings found about 1828, 

 an Nepaul, by the British Resident there, Mr 

 Hodgson : these, regarded by the Nepaulese as 

 their canonical works, having proved on examina- 

 tion to be Buddhist scriptures. These appear to 

 be the texts from which the Buddhist scriptures 

 of Tibet, Mongolia, and China have been trans- 

 lated. The books of the Ceylon Buddhists, 

 written in Pali, though not translations, substan- 

 tially agree with them, and seem to be a later ver- 

 sion of the same traditions. Since M. Bournouf's 

 -work appeared, several valuable contributions to 

 our knowledge of Buddhism have been made. A 

 copious account of it, as it appears in Ceylon, has 

 been given by Mr Spence Hardy in his Manual 

 .of Buddhism and his Eastern Monachism ; 

 several Russian savants have devoted themselves 

 to the study of the Chinese and Tibetan Buddhist 

 books ; and a complete and elaborate digest of the 

 Avhole subject has been given by Carl Friedrich 

 Kceppen of Berlin, in two volumes, one on the 

 Religion of the Buddha and its Origin, the other \ 

 on the Laniaist Hierarchy of Tibet. The means 

 of giving a circumstantial history of Buddhism 

 are still wanting, but the outline of its history is 

 no longer doubtful. 



It had its origin in the north of India, and the j 

 date of its origin, fixed by events in Indian history ' 

 -which have been chronicled by foreign historians, 

 may be with confidence referred to the early part 

 of the sixth century before the Christian era. 

 That, as now received, it was of gradual growth, 

 cannot be questioned ; and it has been doubted 

 whether its alleged founder, whose history is over- 

 laid with a mass of extravagant and incredible 

 legend, was an actual historical personage. The 

 most eminentj however, among those who have 

 investigated this question, are satisfied that he 

 was an actual person, and that there is more or ; 



428 



less of truth underlying the wild accounts we have 

 of his history. Assuming this, his name was Sar- 

 varthasidda ; he was of the warrior caste, and was 

 son of the king of Kapilavastu, a small state in 

 the north-east of Oude. He is often called Sakya, 

 from the name of his family, and Gautama from 

 the name of the race of which his family was a 

 branch ; and Sakya often becomes Sakya-muni, the 

 recluse or sage of the Sakya family. According 

 to the legend, his conception was immaculate, and 

 his birth was attended with signs and wonders. 

 In his infancy and boyhood, he was a prodigy in all 

 kinds of acquirements, intellectual and physical. 

 He early betrayed a disposition to retire from the 

 world ; to counteract which, his father had him 

 married to a charming princess, and surrounded 

 with temptations to dissipation and self-indulgence. 

 Twelve years spent amid the pleasures of a luxuri- 

 ous court, however, left him oppressed with the 

 feeling that the best life can give is vanity and 

 vexation of spirit The thought of having to 

 undergo the burden of existence through an in- 

 definite series of changes, which the doctrine of 

 transmigration presented to him, grew insupport- 

 able. He resolved to search for some way of 

 deliverance from the misery of life, for himself 

 and others. He fled secretly from his father's 

 court, and began the life of an ascetic. This was 

 when he was about thirty years of age. During 

 six years, he subjected himself to every austerity 

 practised among his countrymen. His austerities, 

 however, proved as unsatisfactory as his pleasures. 

 He returned for a time to a more rational way of 

 life, and thereupon was forsaken by five disciples 

 whom his severe asceticisms had drawn to him, 

 and filled with the hope that they would, through 

 him, receive enlightenment. At length, we are 

 told, he seated himself under a tree, resolved not 

 to rise up till he had seen the way to deliverance. 

 Here he underwent unmoved a fierce assault from 

 Mara, the god of sensuality, of sin and death, who 

 set upon him with a whole army of monsters (by 

 which may be understood the desires and passions). 

 The temptation past, he remained immersed in 

 contemplation, and at last he pierced the veil of 

 ignorance, by means of which men are held in 

 the toils of illusion, and that light burst upon him 

 in which all things stand disclosed as they are. 

 He comprehended the illusory nature of life, and 

 was free from repetition of illusion. In com- 

 prehending that, he comprehended everything, and 

 was become virtually omniscient. He remem- 

 bered all his former transmigrations, and the 

 transmigrations of all other beings. He saw at a 

 glance the innumerable worlds. He perceived 

 that concatenation of cause and effect which, 

 determining all things, necessitates re-birth, and 

 how the chain might be broken. He had 

 attained to the perfect intelligence called Bodhi, 

 and become Buddha, the being of perfect intelli- 

 gence, the perfectly wise. The spot where this 

 occurred, Bodhimanda, in Nepaul, is counted by 

 Buddhists the centre of the earth ; and the tree 

 under which the Buddha sat became an object of 

 veneration to his followers, under the name of the 

 tree of intelligence. He at once began to preach 

 his new gospel, and he continued preaching it for 

 forty-five years. Every spot where a Buddhist 

 monastery was afterwards founded, claimed the 

 honour of having been visited by him, and he is 

 even alleged to have transported himself, by a 



