506 Examination of the Pdli Buddhistical Annals. [July, 



It is maintained, and the Buddhists in Ceylon implicitly believe, that 

 the whole of the Pitakattayan and Atthakathd were preserved through 

 this long line of the disciples of Sa'kya exclusively by memorial 

 inspiration, without the aid of inscribed record. 



In B. C. 306 Mahindo, the son of emperor Dhammasoko also re- 

 cognized to be one of those inspired disciples, visited Ceylon, and 

 established Buddhism in it. 



The particulars of this interesting historical event will be found in 

 the Mahdwanso. In this place I shall only observe that the Pitakat- 

 tayan in Pali, and the Atthakathd in Singhalese are represented to 

 have been orally promulgated by Mahindo, and orally perpetuated by 

 the priesthood he founded in Ceylon, till the reign of the Ceylonese 

 monarch Wattaganini, who reigned from B. C. 104 to B. C. 76; 

 when they are stated to have been recorded in books for the first 

 time. The event is thus mentioned in the thirty-third chapter of the 

 Mahdwanso. I give the Pali passage also, to show, how utterly im- 

 possible it is to make it approximate to any rendering, which would 

 admit of the only construction which a reasonable person would wish 

 to place on it, viz. : that these sacred records were then for the first 

 time not recorded, but rendered accessible to the uninitiated. 



Pitakattayapdlincha, tassd Atthakathancha tan, 

 Mukhapdthira dnesur pubbe bhikkhu mah&mati, 

 Hdnin diswdra Sattdnan tadd bhikkhu sam&gatd, 

 Chiratthittathan dhammassa potthakesu likhdpayun. 

 The profoundly -wise (inspired) priests had theretofore orally perpetuated the 

 text of the Pitakattayan and their Atthakathd. At this period, these priests, 

 foreseeing the perdition of the people (from the perversions of the true doctrines) 

 assembled; and in order that religion might endure for ages, recorded the same 

 in hooks. 



In this form (that is to say, the Pitakattayan in Pdli, and At- 

 thakathd in Singhalese), the Buddhistical scriptures were preserved in 

 Ceylon till the reign of the Ceylonese monarch Maha'namo, between 

 A. D. 410 and 432, when Buddhaghoso of Magadha visited Ceylon, 

 revised the Atthakathd and translated them into Pdli. This is an 

 occurrence, as I have noticed above, of considerable importance to 

 the questions under consideration. I am told that in his revised 

 Atthakathd will be found notices explanatory of his personal his- 

 tory. I have not yet come upon those passages, and even if I had 

 met with them, I should prefer the evidence of a third party to an 

 autobiography, especially when I can quote from such an historian as 

 the author of the Mahdwanso, who flourished between the years A. D. 

 459 and A. D. 477, being at the most fifty years only after the visit 



