102 



or possibility of mistake," it follows, that all the statements macb 

 in the Commentaries by Mahinda having reference to the presence 

 of Buddha in Ceylon, and for which there is no warrant whatever 

 in the Pitakas, were after-thoughts; pious frauds, invented for 

 the express purpose of imposing upon the Sinhalese, from the king 

 downwards, the authority of Buddha himself for rendering sacred 

 certain places and objects of worship ; — a trick to which priest- 

 craft has resorted in all ages, in order to buttress up what was 

 false and hollow, and to practise upon the credulity of mankind, in 

 matters of religious belief, from the days of Nimrod down to those 

 of the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith. 



We have thus seen, that neither in the Pitakas, nor in Mahinda's 

 Commentaries, nor in the account of his mission to Ceylon given 

 in the Mahawanso, nor in the Dipawansa, is there any evidence 

 of a belief in the existence of the Foot-print in Ceylon, from 

 543 B.C. to 302 a.d. * a period of 880 years from the date which 

 Buddhist legends assign as the time of its impression. 



But, as has been already stated, in the year 400 a.d., Budda- 

 ghosa arrived in Ceylon for the purpose of translating into Pali 

 the Commentaries of Mahinda :f — and so extraordinary were the 



* There is an allusion in the Mahawanso (in the account of the death of Duttu- 

 gamine, b. c. 137,) to the mountain Sumana, -where it is said, the thero Maliyadewo 

 and five hundred of the fraternity resided; but the object of the statement being 

 to elevate the order of the priesthood, and to shew that the smallest alms to them 

 outweighed in merit the greatest of all other kingly deeds, the account is at best 

 a very apocryphal one. It is however possible that from an early period priests 

 resided in viharas at the base of the mountain, perhaps even at Palabaddala. But 

 such a fact, taken by itself, is no evidence in favor of a belief in the existence, of 

 the Foot-print at that time. 



f These commentaries, in the original Sinhalese, are not now extant, having 

 been destroyed in the raids against religious writings, which were made by usurp- 

 ing Tamil and apostate native kings, in their efforts to extirpate Buddhism in 

 Ceylon. These efforts were so far effectual that on more than one occasion, after 



