with his name; and by the persuasiveness of his speech, the benevolence and attractiveness of his disposition, and the truth, or apparent truth, of what he inculcated, gained numerous adherents. The legends which have been invented about him form of themselves an enormous literature; but what I have just said is, I believe, nearly all that we certainly know about him. So far as I can judge, the attempts made to separate between fact and fiction in the legend of Buddha are almost as delusive as the attempts which used to be made to account for the attributes and actions assigned to Jupiter by the character and deeds of a ruler of Crete. While Buddha, however, unlike Confucius or Mohammed, is almost entirely a mythical, and not an historical personage, the myth of Buddha is far more important in the system of Buddhism than the life of Confucius in the system of Confucianism, or of Mohammed in Mohammedanism. It is a peculiarity which Buddhism alone shares with Christianity, that it concentrates itself in a person. It presents an ideal. It embodies its teaching in an example. It gives an object for affection. This, there can be no doubt, is one of the main sources which has enabled it, in spite of the withering nature of its dogmas, to spread so extensively, to root itself so deeply, and to retain its hold so tenaciously. For the character of the mythical Buddha, although in many respects wildly

extravagant, is invested with an undeniable moral grandeur and spiritual impressiveness. It exhibits in the most striking manner all the gentler virtues. It is simply amazing how far on this side it transcends the Platonic, Aristotelian, Stoic, and Epicurean ideals of the sage, and how mean and superficial even it causes the boasted wisdom of the classical world to appear. Among its features are a love without limits, self-sacrifice, justice, purity. Buddha is represented as freely enduring the severest afflictions, and freely foregoing for ages final beatitude in order to work out the salvation of others. He announced his law as a law of good news to all. He preached his gospel to the poor no less than to the rich, to the Soudra as unreservedly as to the Brahmin. He took to his heart. all living creatures. He enjoined a charity which was not limited by race, caste, religion, or anything else. He counselled all to live a virtuous life, gentle and prudent, lowly and teachable, resolute and diligent, unshaken in misfortune, uninfluenced by partiality, wrath, folly, or fear, faithful in the discharge of the relative duties, and actively benevolent; and to all who thus live, whatever be their station, circumstances, or creed, he promised victory over this world, and, if not Nirvana, rebirth in heavenly mansions. Hence, doubtless, it is that he has gained so many hearts, and drawn from them, as it were, the confession of the young

householder Sighala, "It is wonderful, master! it is wonderful! 'Tis as if one should set up again that which is overthrown, or should reveal that which is hidden, or should direct the wanderer into the right path, or hold out a lamp in the darkness, -so that they that have eyes to see shall see. Yea, even thus has the blessed Lord made known. the truth to me in many a figure. And I, even I, do put my trust in thee, and in thy law, and in thy church. Receive me, Lord, as thy disciple and true believer from this time forth, as long as life endures."

The modern German philosophers who accept the Buddhist theory of existence and life as substantially the true one, to which Christianity and every other form of theism must give place, do not ask us, of course, to accept any legend or myth like that of Buddha. They only seek for assent to the fundamental doctrines of an essentially Buddhistic creed. They set forth a modified Buddhism without Buddha, and thus strike off a multitude of extravagances which European minds could never be expected to entertain. If they thus, however, relieve the system from a heavy burden, they also deprive it of its chief source of strength and vitality. Buddhism without Buddha-Buddhism reduced to a merely atheistic and pessimistic theory-would be a wretched substitute even for Buddhism in its integrity. It is impossible to imagine what virtues

it could either elicit or sustain. It may spread, but only in a sceptical and cynical age. It can no more reasonably be expected to call forth enthusiasm for the true, the beautiful, and the good, than snow and ice can reasonably be expected to kindle a conflagration and set the world on fire. Its diffusion through a society can only mean that vital power is ebbing from it, and the chill of death creeping over it. Life cannot be sustained on the doctrine that there is nothing worth living for. Modern pessimism is merely this doctrine elaborately developed. Buddhism is this also, but it is a great deal more; and in what it is more, lies chiefly the reason why it has exerted in many respects a beneficial influence.

I might proceed to indicate a number of differences between Buddhism and German pessimism, which arise from the ancient and Asiatic origin of the former and the modern and European origin of the latter; but as time forbids, and this is not a philosophical essay, but a lecture with a practical purpose in view, I hasten to say that Buddhism and the recent forms of pessimism are substantially agreed as to the nature and worth of existence. Buddhism has the merit of possessing a perfectly definite aim. It professes to show men how they may be delivered from evil. But what is evil? Evil, according to Buddhism, is of the very essence of existence. Wherever existence is there is evil.

It is not man only, but all sentient beings, which have been made to mourn; it is not this world only which is a vale of tears, but all other worlds are also vain and doomed to misery. Buddha looks through the whole universe; at every insect, every creeping thing, the fish of the sea, the fowl of the air, and the beast of the field; at man, in all stages from birth to death, and in all conditions from the monarch to the mendicant; at the generations which have passed away, and at those which are to come; at the worlds above and the worlds below, and at the innumerable intelligences which inhabit them, and he sees that nowhere is there any true peace or secure happiness. Wherever the stream of existence flows-yea, even when it is through the lives of the highest gods-there unreality and uncertainty are to be found, and sorrow is to be feared. Christianity rests on the belief that God made all things very good, and that the evil in the world is due to sin,-to the perversity of the creaturely will. Buddhism, on the contrary, rests on the belief that all things are very bad; that existence is in itself evil; and that sin is only one of the necessary consequences of existence. It does not deny that there are pleasures, but it maintains that they are so rooted in delusion, and so surely followed by pains, that a wise man must desire not to be captivated by them. It admits that there are many seeming good things in life,