BUDDHISM. 
243 
mittihg men of every class to embrace a monastic life, 
and by abolishing in a great degree the use of bloody 
sacrifices. Hence it is probable that the remnant of 
the Buddhists may have been lost in the Jains and 
Vishnuvies. 
It would be inconsistent with the limits of this 
work to enter into any consideration of the Buddhistic 
sects, or to describe the modifications which that re- 
ligion has received from the character of the different 
nations in which it has been established; still less 
to pursue the difficult and important inquiry of the 
effects produced by Buddhism indirectly ; but I may 
be permitted to remark that decisive traces of its 
influence are to be discovered in the Gnostic here- 
sies that corrupted Christianity, and in the Sufeeism 
which threatens at no distant day to overthrow Ma- 
homedanism. 
