296 TRAVEL, AD VENTURE, AND SPORT. 



in its kind, imperturbable, free from all obscurity, a 

 touchstone for all other things, perfect throughout," 

 and which, according to the " Kalpa Sutra," was the 

 characteristic of my immediate and revered predeces- 

 sor, the Ti'rthankara Malmvira. 



There appears to be little doubt that Jainism is a 

 corrupt form of Budhism, and that it first appeared 

 in definite historical shape about the ninth century 

 of the Christian era, though, a much higher antiquity 

 and a more independent origin have been claimed for 

 it, chiefly from the mention of a certain person called 

 Gautama among the disciples of Mahavira. It may 

 be regarded as a southern counterpart of the Lamaism 

 of Tibet, and is Budhism largely affected by (the also 

 corrupt) Brahmanical Hinduism. In its most essential 

 doctrines it is Budhistic, and especially in that, the 

 most essential of all, which regards all phenomenal 

 existence as absolutely evil, but an evil which can be 

 escaped from by prayer, meditation, self-denial, extinc- 

 tion of passion, and entire abnegation of every kind. 



It is absurd to raise a question, as many have done, 

 whether the Nirvana of the Budhists means annihila- 

 tion ; and to do so only proves that the critic has 

 failed to grasp the meaning of this primary doctrine. 

 Schopenhauer, the great modern European Biidhist, 

 well expressed this doctrine in his primary moral 

 maxim " Im esse nicht in operari liegt die Freiheit ; " 

 and he took the severely-reasoned philosophy of Kant 

 as his starting-point. In a certain sense, both his 



