1879.] 
E. Thomas— Jainism. 
3 
cottus.”* A partial reconciliation of the error was proposed by the method 
of restoring to the dynasty of the Nandas the full hundred years assigned 
to them by some Pauranik authorities, in lieu of the forty-four allowed for 
in the Ceylon lists ; but if the local annals were so dependent for their 
accuracy upon extra-national corrections, their intrinsic merits could have 
stood but little above zero ; and any such summary introduction of sixty- 
six years from outside sources could scarcely have been held to be satisfac¬ 
tory, unless the assumed total of 543 years B. C. were proved to be a fixed 
quantity by better external testimony than has hitherto been adduced. 
To General Cunningham belongs the merit of having first proposed, in 
1854, the fixing of Buddha’s Nirvana in “ 477 B. C.”+—a result which he 
obtained from original figure calculations; while Max Mfiller, m 1859, 
independently arrived at the same conclusion, from a more extended critical 
review of the extant literary evidence.]: 
General Cunningham has lately enlarged the sphere of his observations, 
and in adopting Colebrooke’s view in regard to the fact that Gautama 
Buddha was “ the disciple of Mahavira,” has materially fortified his early 
arguments—in re-asserting that the Nirvana of Buddha must be placed in 
“478 B. C.,” or “forty-nine years”§ after the release of Mahavira, the 
last of the Jinas. 
The passages relied upon by Colebrooke in 182G|| have since been con- 
firmed by important contributions from other sources. None, liowevei, 
bring the question home so distinctly and in so quaintly graphic a way as 
Prof. Weber’s translation of a passage from the ‘ Bhagavatq’f wherein e 
Chela, “the holy Mahavira’s eldest pupil, Indrabhuti”—“ houseless of 
Gautama’s Gotra,”—begins to distrust the negative perfection of Jainism, 
in the terms of the text,-“ Thereupon that holy Gautama, m whom faith, 
doubt, and curiosity arose, grew and increased, rose up. Having arisen, le 
went to the place where the sacred Qramana Mahavira was...... ...After per¬ 
forming these [salutations] he praises him and bows to him After so 
doing, not too close, not too distant, listening to him, bowing to linn, with 
his face towards him, humbly waiting on him with folded hands, he thus 
SP ° k In conclusion, I may recapitulate certain deductions, which I have 
suggested elsewhere. The juxtaposition of the last representative of the 
* The Mahawanso, Ceylon, 1837, pp. xlviii, l.-lii, &c. 
f Journal Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1854, p. 704. 
J ‘Ancient Sanskrit Literature,’ London, 1859, p.j298. 
6 ‘ Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum,’ Calcutta, 1877, P- v. . 
|| p r of. Cowell’s edition of Colebrooke’s ‘Essays, II, 278, lanaac ions >.oja 
Asiatic Society, I, 520. 
H ‘ Fragment der Bhagavati,’ Berlin, 1867. 
