570 Interpretation of the inscription [July, 



another place I have rendered a final expression agnim namisati, ' shall 

 give praise to AgnV — a deity we are hardly at liberty to pronounce 

 connected with the Buddhist worship, though points of agreement 

 and harmony may be adduced. But in any case Agni if rendered 

 generally as ' god' keeps him distinct from Buddha ' the teacher/ of 

 whose deification no evidence is afforded by the inscription ; for 

 neither is there any allusion to images of him, nor to temples or 

 shrines enclosing his relics. It is only by the general tenor of the 

 dogmas inculcated, that we can pronounce it to relate to the Buddhist 

 religion. The sacred name constantly employed — the true keystone 

 of Shakya's reform — is Dhamma (or dharma), ' virtue ;' upon the 

 exceeding excellencies, and the incontestable supremacy, of which 

 divine attribute the whole of his system seems to have originally 

 rested, and by which it may have won its way to the hearts of a peo- 

 ple whose inclinations were already imbued with admiration of this 

 quality in their own ancient system, though it fiad since been mixed 

 up with an unseemly mass of inconsistencies and gross idolatries : 

 and the pious and reflecting must have been glad to reject them, when 

 an opportunity was afforded of saving thejf consciences from the 

 dreadful alternative of being thought to throw off all religion, if they 

 discarded the one in which they were born and bred. Buddhism 

 was at that time only sectarianism ; a dissent from a vast proportion 

 of the existing sophistry and metaphysics of the Brahmanical schools, 

 without an absolute relinquishment of belief in their gods, or of con- 

 formity in their usages, and with adherence still to the milder 

 qualities of the religion, to all in short that it contained of dharma, 

 — virtue, justice, law. The very term Devdnampiya, ' beloved of the 

 gods/ shews the retention of the Hindu pantheon generally ; and this 

 might be easily confirmed by reference to Mr. Csoma's note on the 

 birth and life of Shakya. 



Those who have studied the mystics of Buddhism from the lucid 

 dissertation of Mr. Hodgson in the January and February Nos. of 

 last year's Journal, will know that Dharma is the second member of 

 the Tridmndya, or triad, — (Buddha, Dharma, Sang ha, — J according 

 to the theistical school ; while what Mr. Hodgson calls the atheistical 

 school exalts Dharma to the first place. With them " Dharma is Diva 

 natura, matter as the sole entity, invested with intrinsic activity and 

 intelligence, the efficient and material cause of all : — Buddha is 

 derivative from Dharma, is the active and intelligent force of nature 

 first put off from it and then operating upon it :—*Sangha is the result 

 of that operation; is embryotic creation, the type and sum of all 



