136 Original of the Sdrndth and Tirhut [March, 



Is thus set forth by the great Sramanas. 



* No vice is to be committed : 



Every virtue must be perfectly practised : 



The mind must be brought under entire subjection ; 



This is the commandment of Buddha.' " 

 It is unfortunate that the Sanscrit text of the moral maxim 

 has not been any where found in the Lantsa copy of the Prajna Pa- 

 ramita. Its authenticity rests, therefore, solely on the Tibetan version, 

 in which there is apparently some error ; for the sentence, as it stands, 

 is not pure Sanscrit, and certainly will not bear the interpretation 

 which Mr. Csoma has given literally from the vernacular translation 

 of Tibet. Dr. Mill has favored me with some valuable observations on 

 the passage, which, with his permission, I here insert. Mr. Hodgson 

 will doubtless be able to confirm the true reading by consulting the 



Sanscrit original of the S^<Z T \^ r %.W T \$^ , ^ r< Z£*\ dPah-var 

 Agrovahi tinge Adsin (Sans, shurangama samddhi, the heroical extasy), 

 which may still exist in some of the monasteries of Nepal. 



" The interesting discovery of thepassageinthe Buddhist sacred books from which 

 the S&rn&th inscription is taken, by M. Csoma de Koros, removes all doubt as to 

 the reading of the first word which I unfortunately took for the demonstrative 

 pronoun ^rsj, whereas it is the relative ij to which the ^q\ in the next line 

 refers. It follows that the next word ■qjff should be read separately from 

 the compound %rr5r*r3"T: wnich * s °f course plural. M. Csoma's version is 

 here perfectly agreeable to the Sanscrit ; and my translation of the former half 

 of this sentence requires to be corrected by his. 



I am by no means equally well satisfied with the other sentence quoted by M. 

 Csoma as following the former in some of the places where it occurs in the Bud- 

 dhist scriptures : the Sanscrit text of which is certainly corrupted in the copies he 

 cites, and, except in the last line, exhibits no sentence corresponding in form to his 

 Latin or English version. I have also very considerable doubt of the accuracy 

 of the opinion, that this second stanza is the clue to the supposed enigma in the 

 first, or necessary in any respect to complete its meaning. That it is even the 

 object of reference in the former stanza, appears to me doubtful. The occurrence 

 of the former passage, — not only in the two several inscriptions of Benares and 

 Tirhut, by itself, — but at the end of chapters in the places you pointed out to me 

 from M. Csoma's Lantsa MSS., seem to indicate that it has a complete meaning 

 in itself: and the Vef " thus" or " alike" of the fourth line may as well be 

 understood with reference to the preceding clause, as to any sentence following. 

 The metrical structure of the two passages confirms me in the idea of their indepen- 

 dency : the latter being in the ordinary Anustup measure, with about the same 

 degree of license as we find that measure in the Pur&nas : whereas the former, 

 though approximating in places to the measure of eight syllables, is as remote 

 from the rules of Valmiki's sloka as are the hymns of the Vedas : and it is equally 

 irreducible to the laws of the A'rya or any more modern poetical measure. 



In the translation of the latter passage, I would advert particularly to the line 

 which M. Csoma has translated, ' Every virtue must be practised.' I do not see how 



