184 REV. RICHARD COLLINS, M.A. 
Mr. W. Sr. Cuap Boscawey.—I agree with Mr. Hackett in saying 
that the connexion between Krishna and Christianity demands from us 
the Scotch verdict of “not proven.” We know that a school of thought 
has been gaining ground in England and America, which connects Buddhism 
and Christianity,—a school which has been chiefly guided by a work Mr. 
Howard mentioned, Arnold’s Light of Asia. I have recently heard a paper 
read on that work in connexion with the work of Christianity, and I must 
congratulate Mr. Collins, who has had a long experience in India (as also 
had the gentleman who read the paper I refer to), on the fact that he has 
not fallen into the errors which were undoubtedly apparent in the paper 
recently heard. But I think that the more practical way of looking at the 
subject is to take account of the points with which the author of the paper 
has dealt in relation to a number of Indian myths. There is one, for 
instance, which has reference to the placing of the child Krishna in a 
basket and sending it over a river. This is common to half-a-dozen other 
mythical personages, between whom we cannot establish the slightest 
connexion. I may mention Sargon, King of Babylonia, and the same story 
is told of Moses, of Romulus, and of the Greek hero,, Perseus, while it 
appears in five or six other forms which I cannot at the present moment 
remember: however, it is well known that the water-baby is quite a 
common feature in mythology. Again, we have the birth of the hero from a 
virgin as a common allegation, and we are not supposed to show that every 
such myth is to be connected with Christianity. In fact, I think there is 
just as much risk in making these comparisons on the one side as on the 
other. The paper is written from an Indian point of view, of which I know 
very little, but it seems to me that the endeavour to establish the intro- 
duction and influence of Christianity in India as having a bearing on the 
form of the Indian religions is somewhat weak. The solar myth, we know, 
has been applied to Biblical heroes as well as to other heroes, and the most 
formidable attack of all was that on which Dr. Goltzieher based his cele- 
brated work, The Mythology of the Hebrews, a good deal of which we 
cannot believe, though there is much in it that we must highly value. <A | 
great deal that was there advanced was founded on an essay by a German 
student, perhaps one of the most powerful essays that has been written on 
the solar myth. It relates to the myth of Samson, as it is there put, and 
the story of Samson presents a remarkable resemblance in name and 
general character to a well-known Oriental story, which Dr. Steinthal 
made out. The essay is a very valuable one ; but the danger is dealing 
with similarities without being able to prove any historical connexion, 
because if you are proving influence, one way or the other, you must prove 
it historically. I must say I am not sorry to find that the condition of the 
chronology of Indian literature is almost as difficult and perplexing as that 
of other nations. Mr. Budge, of the British Museum, recently discovered 
a document, which contains many of the clauses of the Nicene Creed. The 
document was taken from the Temple of Ammon, and is of a very early date, 
the 18th or 19th Dynasty, and yet it contains clauses of the Nicene Creed, 
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